Pilot production experience of a recycled plastic aggregate manufactured using plastic from waste of electrical and electronic equipment

Abstract

In the last few years, in the Experimental Center of Social Housing (Argentina), a new safe technology for the recycling of the plastic fraction of waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEEP) was developed. The cement is applied as a cover to the shredder plastic particles to form a new core-shell recycled plastic aggregate (RPA) which could be used as an aggregate for mortars and concrete mixtures. The results about stabilization of both organic and inorganic contaminants present in this plastic waste are positives and promising to position this technology as an alternative for re-value the WEEEP.On the other hand, the machinery and process to implement this technology is simple and low-cost demanding. In this sense, the pilot scale production of the core-shell RPA was implemented. The capacity of processing of each batch in this pilot process was 25 kg of WEEEP and the machinery was handled by two operators. The core-shell RPA obtained enables the manufacturing of different cement based building components.The implementation of this technology at pilot scale was satisfactory through a simple and low-cost process. Thus, the proposed recycling technology has great potential to be implemented by small factories, NGOs, cooperatives and Government ventures.