Recycling plastic bottles into brooms - GIF

[Altair]

Recycling plastic bottles into brooms.




Previously:

Recycling brake pads - GIF
Recycling tin cans - GIF
Recycling plastic into pellets - GIFs
Plastic recycling machine - GIF
Circuit board recycling GIF

[neilbourjaily]

Set that up at the local farmers' market and sell a bunch of them.

[nova_robotics]

This is great. PET is an excellent plastic with some really great properties. Making some sort of filament and finding a use for it is a much better answer than plastic "recycling." I put recycling in quotes because basically everything we put into the recycling bin goes straight to trash. Almost none of it is actually recycled.

Along those lines, a few companies have popped up that are using plastic as aggregate for asphalt. It's a good idea and improves the properties of the asphalt.

[bob_3000]

This is great. PET is an excellent plastic with some really great properties. Making some sort of filament and finding a use for it is a much better answer than plastic "recycling.

Sadly those brooms are microplastic factories...straw is the way of the future.

[Saaglem]

This is done in New Zealand for the past 5 years. Downer New Zealand has a plant that not just use plastic but also use shredded tires in the same process in our roads. This process is not yet used for our highways but is taken over in our cities.

Cheers

[tooly]

Good recycling idea.
Unfortunately adds to micro plastic pollution.

[hemmjo]

If they use plastic as the binder, then it is no longer an asphalt road.

[nova_robotics]

If they use plastic as the binder, then it is no longer an asphalt road.

They still use asphalt. It's just asphalt as normal, but they add a tiny bit of plastic as aggregate. It's only a few percent plastic waste.

[mwmkravchenko]

Nothing has zero side effects. I am guessing the least egregious is the best choice.

To replace the existing paving infrastructure would be an epic effort.

Get rid of a lot of plastic. To a degree permanent sequestering.

Mark

[Ralphxyz]

I think nova_robotics, has the right idea. I don't believe they are replacing asphalt just using a plastic supplemented aggregate.