title: An innovative recycling process to obtain pure polyethylene and polypropylene from household waste.
abstract: An innovative recycling process, based on magnetic density separation (MDS) and hyperspectral imaging (HSI), to obtain high quality polypropylene and polyethylene as secondary raw materials, is presented. More in details, MDS was applied to two different polyolefin mixtures coming from household waste. The quality of the two separated PP and PE streams, in terms of purity, was evaluated by a classification procedure based on HSI working in the near infrared range (1000-1700 nm). The classification model was built using known PE and PP samples as training set. The results obtained by HSI were compared with those obtained by classical density analysis carried in laboratory on the same polymers. The results obtained by MDS and the quality assessment of the plastic products by HSI showed that the combined action of these two technologies is a valid solution that can be implemented at industrial level.
authors.affiliation: DICMA, Department of Chemical Engineering, Materials and Environment, Sapienza University of Rome, Via Eudossiana 18, 00184 Rome, Italy. Electronic address: silvia.serranti@uniroma1.it.
authors.forename: Silvia
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Serranti
authors.affiliation: DICMA, Department of Chemical Engineering, Materials and Environment, Sapienza University of Rome, Via Eudossiana 18, 00184 Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Valentina
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Luciani
authors.affiliation: DICMA, Department of Chemical Engineering, Materials and Environment, Sapienza University of Rome, Via Eudossiana 18, 00184 Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Giuseppe
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Bonifazi
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Civil Engineering and Geosciences, Delft University of Technology, 2628 CN Delft, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Bin
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Hu
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Civil Engineering and Geosciences, Delft University of Technology, 2628 CN Delft, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Peter C
authors.initials: PC
authors.lastname: Rem
mesh_terms: D004867:Equipment Design; D005191:Family Characteristics; D016018:Least-Squares Analysis; D008280:Magnetics; D008962:Models, Theoretical; D009426:Netherlands; D011090:Polyenes; D020959:Polyethylene; D011126:Polypropylenes; D011786:Quality Control; D059027:Recycling / Q000379:methods*; D012037:Refuse Disposal / Q000379:methods*; D019265:Spectroscopy, Near-Infrared / Q000295:instrumentation / Q000379:methods*
chemical_list: D011090:Polyenes; D011126:Polypropylenes; C035051:PL 732; D020959:Polyethylene
keywords: Household waste; Hyperspectral imaging; Magnetic density separation; Plastic recycling; Polyolefin