PVC Plastic: a Looming Waste Crisis
Future Scenarios - the Growing and intractable PVC Waste Mountains and the PVC-free Solution
As revealed in Chapter 1, the PVC industry is expanding while the long life PVC products start to enter the waste stream. But even if PVC were being halted today, we will still face an inevitable mountain of more than 150 million tonnes of PVC entering the waste stream in the coming decades. No environmentally safe or financially feasible solution exists for this waste problem.
The complete inability of the PVC industry to deal with this impending PVC waste crisis is further illustrated by the fact that less than one per cent of post-consumer PVC is being recycled, leaving hundreds of millions of tonnes of PVC to be landfilled or incinerated in coming decades.
The scale of this impending waste problem in each region depends on how much PVC has been used as a construction material, and on the rate of increase in consumption. Regions which have used growing amounts of PVC since the late 1960’S, such as North America, Japan and Europe, will have a bigger PVC mountain than regions where PVC production and use is only set to increase now, such as Latin America and the rest of Asia.
These newly industrialising countries can benefit from the experience of North America, Japan and Europe. If the latter cannot deal effectively with their PVC waste, it is highly irresponsible of the PVC industry to expand production in other countries. Urgent action is needed now to prevent the mistakes now being learned in industrialised countries being repeated in other areas.
Germany: the true waste reality finally dawns. The best illustration of the failure to deal with the PVC waste problem is provided by Germany, the world’s leading plastic recycler. Research by Greenpeace has found that the total new PVC arising in Germany currently amounts to around 1.3 million tonnes per year. With no government or voluntary restrictions on production, and with a realistic average annual increase of 1-2%, this will rise to 1.6 million tonnes by the year 2010 and 1.8 million tonnes by 2020.
Around 250,000-500,000 tonnes of waste PVC are currently generated each year in Germany (Lahl 1997, Pohle 1997). But this amount will increase by 200-400% in the next twenty years, to over a million tonnes, as long-life products enter the waste stream (Lahl 1997).
Current recycling capacity in Germany is around 30,000-40,000 tonnes, but actual recycling is less than 4,000 tonnes, or 1-2% of the produced waste and less than 0.25% of PVC consumption. Even if the full recycling capacity were being used for the mechanical recycling of post-consumer PVC waste, this would be far from sufficient to deal with the waste problem.
The PVC industry is once again lobbying for incineration of PVC waste, in an attempt to deal with the problem. Even the proposed additional mono-incineration capacity of 250,000 tonnes per year would not be enough to cope with the sheer size of the PVC mountain in the long term. So far no agreement has been reached about this expensive project, and in any case, it cannot be regarded an environmentally sound option.
The PVC-free solution. Virtually all PVC products can be replaced by less environmentally-harmful alternatives, usually at competitive cost. Local governments, retailers and some industries and individuals are already replacing PVC in various applications.
For the building sector, various alternatives are already available on the market (Greenpeace UK 1997). The cost of an average home is about the same with or without PVC. Some alternatives might be slightly cheaper, while others may be slightly more expensive (Van den Heuvel and Van Miltenburg 1996). Throughout Europe, hundreds of local authorities are restricting or banning the use of PVC in construction materials and offices. For the Sydney 2000 Olympics development in Australia, PVC has been banned as part of the environmental guidelines. The new headquarters of the Danish Engineers Association in Copenhagen will be PVC-free (Ingeniøren 1997).
Alternatives to PVC for use in cars have been developed by car manufacturers and are available on the market. Even though the trend is towards increased use of plastics in car manufacturing to minimise weight and therefore energy consumption, there is also a trend towards using fewer types of plastic, to facilitate recycling. There is also a trend among manufacturers towards reducing PVC use. According to experts, PVC will be replaced by alternatives in coming years (Pohle 1997).
Nissan recently announced its development of an alternative to PVC cables, to be used in its cars starting autumn 1997 (Nissan 1997). Opel and Volkswagen are concentrating on the use of polypropylene and will reduce their PVC use. Opel has already replaced the use of PVC undercoating with polyurethane. Undercoatings can also be replaced by hotmelt polyolefins, which are preferable from an environmental point of view. Daimler Benz is focusing on using polypropylene as the main plastic in car manufacturing, and expects to phase out PVC within five years. PVC has already been phased out from its car interiors and undercoating since 1995, and has been replaced by polyolefins and polyurethane (Daimler Benz 1997). Volvo acknowledges that some PVC additives are environmentally hazardous and is phasing out all PVC as a precautionary measure where appropriate alternatives are available. PVC is not used in new models except where critical quality and safety requirements make the use of other materials impossible (Volvo 1997).
As well as manufacturers, a large number of communities and retailers have begun or completed successful efforts to eliminate PVC from their product lines or facilities. For instance, over 200 communities in Europe - including major cities in Austria, the Netherlands, Germany, Sweden, Luxembourg, Denmark and Norway - have policies to restrict or avoid the use of PVC in public construction projects; some have successfully built major new buildings without PVC. In transportation, subway systems in London, Vienna, Dusseldorf and Berlin no longer use PVC cables (Greenpeace UK 1996). The British, German and US Navies do not employ PVC cables for ship-board uses. The Olympic stadium and other parts of the Sydney 2000 Olympic village are being built with a commitment to avoid or minimise the use of PVC.
IKEA (furniture), Tarkett (floorings), The Body Shop (cosmetics), many major European supermarket chains, such as IRMA (Denmark) and Tengelmann (Germany), as well as numerous other retailers throughout the world, have adopted PVC phase-out policies for their lines of appliances, furniture, office equipment, flooring and product packaging.
Political frameworks to phase out PVC include: the Fourth Declaration of the North Sea Ministers Conference to stop environmental discharges of hazardous substances within one generation (25 years) (NSMC 1995); the OSPAR convention agreement to eliminate hazardous substances, in particular organohalogens, from the North East Atlantic region (OSPAR1992) and the IJC recommendation to eliminate the use of chlorine as a feedstock for the chemical industry in the Great Lakes area in the USA and Canada (IJC 1992). According to the Chemical Policy Committee in Sweden (1997), PVC has no place in a sustainable society and should be phased out for all uses by the year 2007. Denmark has proposed restrictions on the use of additives, such as phthalates and lead, and on PVC incineration (Danish Environment Ministry 1991, Danish EPA 1998) and is questioning the recycling potential of PVC (Ends 1997). The Czech Republic has banned the production, import and use of PVC packaging starting the 1st of January 2001 (Czech Republic 1997). Switzerland banned PVC mineral water bottles in 1991 (Swiss Council of Ministers 1990). The upcoming global convention on persistant organic pollutants has targetted dioxin as one of twelve priority pollutants for futher reduction and/or elimination (UNEP 1995), making PVC a focus of concern.
Yet few governments are actually implementing PVC phase-outs. The Swedish and Danish Parliaments are currently debating measures to do so. These initiatives should be supported and emulated by other governments. As this report makes clear, there is no other solution to the PVC waste crisis than to bring PVC consumption to a halt as soon as possible, which would also prevent environmental and health threats from PVC production and use.
So what about other plastics? The pyramid of plastic problems. Most of the products we manufacture today are contributing to a global waste crisis. Resources are consumed unsustainably, processed inefficiently - often into superfluous, disposable products - and then dumped as waste.
The following is an attempt to ‘rank’ the most common plastics in order of environmental and human health problems related to production, additives, product emissions and disposal and fires. The aim is to provide a basis for choosing and developing alternatives for PVC uses: the further you go down the pyramid, the less harmful the plastic is for the environment.
Note that this is only an assessment of inherent material characteristics. Ultimately it is necessary to ask why we are using these materials in the first place, and whether they are necessary. Often, natural materials like wood (from sustainable forestry) are a much better choice. In the end, no petroleum-based plastic is sustainable and we must move quickly to a material economy based on appropriateness, renewability and efficiency. As for the plastics economy, biobased and biodegradable plastics hold out most promise for the future.
The plastics pyramid of problems
1. Polyvinylchloride (PVC) is unique in its chlorine and additives content, which makes it an environmental poison throughout its life cycle, including disposal. However other plastics also generate toxic emissions and are not without problems.
2a. Polyurethane (PU) is mainly used in insulation and soft/foamed products like carpet underlay. Its production consumes about 11% of the world-wide chlorine production (Bie 1994), uses several hazardous intermediates and creates numerous hazardous by-products. These include phosgene, isocyanates, toluene, diamines, and the ozone-depleting gases methylene chloride and CFCs, as well as halogenated flame retardants and pigments. PU production has been linked to occupational health problems, including isocyanate-asthma, which is a life threatening disease (DTI 1993). The burning of PU releases numerous hazardous chemicals such as isocyanates, carbon dioxide, hydrogen cyanide, PAHs and dioxins. Dioxins and other halogenated compounds are produced if CFC’s or halogenated flame retardants are present. In landfills, PU ester foams have been observed to degrade, generating leachates and releasing ozone-destroying CFCs and HCFCs (DTI 1993).
Due to PU’s problematic production processes, the Danish Environmental Protection Agency concluded that isocyanates result in considerable disadvantages in the work environment compared with PVC. When using PU, environmental improvements will be obtained in waste management due to the absence of heavy metals and chlorine. However, those advantages are not sufficient to make it a good alternative.
Several chlorine-free production routes for PU have been developed (Prognos 1994). These are an environmental improvement, but the alternative processes still use hazardous isocyanates as intermediates. According to industry, flexible PU foam is recyclable into new high quality flexible foam products, but this is predominantly virgin PU foam scrap recycling, as very few flexible PU recycling processes use post-consumer waste (Hillier 1997). The available evidence indicates that, although it is less problematic than PVC and some environmental improvements can be obtained with PU, it is not advisable as an alternative to PVC.
2b. Polystyrene (PS) is widely used for foam insulation and also for hard applications like cups and toys. Its production involves the use of known (benzene) and suspected human carcinogenic substances (styrene and 1,3-butadiene) (DTI 1993). Styrene is also known to be toxic to the reproductive system. PS poses significant fire hazards, for example, it played an important role in starting the Dusseldorf Airport fire in 1996 (Weinspach et al. 1997). However, it requires far fewer additives than PVC. Styrenes and PAHs will be formed during the burning of PS. Hydrogen chloride and dioxins are released if brominated or chlorinated flame retardants are present. The carcinogenic styrene oxide is released during processing (DTI 1993).
PS can be technically recycled, but recycling rates are low, although still higher than for PVC. Although PS is less problematic than PVC because it has far fewer additives than PVC and does not contain chlorine, it is not advisable as an substitute for PVC, mainly because of the hazards associated with the raw materials, some of which are carcinogenic or reproductive toxins.
2c. Acrylonitrile-butadiene-styrene (ABS) is used as a hard plastic in many applications like pipes, car bumpers and toys (hard building blocks). ABS uses a number of hazardous chemicals. These include butadiene and styrene (see above) and acrylonitrile. Acrylonitrile is highly toxic and readily absorbed by humans by inhalation and directly through the skin. Both the liquid and its vapour are highly toxic, displaying many of the characteristics of the cyanide ion. The vapour is heavier than air and may cause severe eye irritation, headache and nausea. Acrylonitrile is classified as a probable human carcinogen (Coode Island Review Panel 1991) as are styrene and butadiene. Additives used include antioxidants and light stabilisers. Antioxidants are needed since ABS undergoes auto-oxidation. Photo-oxidation is controlled by adding light stabilisers, pigments, protective coatings and film. Flame retardants include antimony-based and halogen-based compounds. Because of its varied composition, ABS is extremely difficult to recycle. ABS is less problematic than PVC, but its many toxic constituents make it inadvisable as an alternative to PVC (Greenpeace Australia 1996).
2d. Polycarbonate (PC) is used for products like CDs and refillable milk bottles and is usually made using the highly toxic phosgene -derived from chlorine gas. PC does not need additives but does need solvents for its production, such as methylene chloride, a carcinogen. Other solvents used may include chloroform, 1,2-dichloroethylene, tetrachloroethane and chlorobenzene. New non-chlorine polycarbonate production processes are being developed (Prognos 1994), which would avoid using chlorine, phosgene and some chlorinated hydrocarbons. But PC production, including the chlorine-free process, also involves the use of Bisphenol A (Prognos 1994), an endocrine disrupter. This can leach from polycarbonate flasks during autoclaving (Krishnan et al. 1993) and in tests meant to simulate the use and cleaning of plastic food ware, such as polycarbonate baby bottles (Raloff 1997).
Recently a new chlorine free synthesis route for polycarbonate has been developed based on oxidative carbonylation using phenol instead of bisphenol A (Comline News Service 16 December 1997). This new route seems a very significant improvement of polycarbonate’s environmental profile, because it avoids the use of chlorine, phosgene and bisphenol A, which could move the plastic down the pyramid of dangerous plastics.
A number of processes have been developed to reclaim polycarbonate from compact discs and PC milk and water bottles, for downcycling into lower quality products such as carrying crates or building applications, or for mixing in small quantities with virgin material for higher grade products such as bottles (Nir et al. 1993).
3. Polyethylene-terephthalate (PET) is made from ethylene glycol and dimethyl terephthalate. PET is generally used in packaging (e.g. bottles) and often contains additives such as UV stabilisers and flame retardants. The total amount of pigments and additives may be as high as 30% (DTI 1993), which is still significantly less than the amount of additives in PVC. In the production of PET, a number of substances irritating to the eyes and respiratory tract are used. There are indications of a small excess of cancer incidence associated with PET manufacturing. Heavy metals may be used as a catalyst during production and end up in the environment. However according to the Danish Technology Institute, PET does not give rise to severe impacts. Compared to PVC, PET has less risks for the workers and the environment, and advantages in waste management, including recycling, and risk of accidents. (DTI 1993). PET recycling rates are high compared to other plastics (see chapter 3).
4. The polyolefins such as Polyethylene (PE) and Polypropylene (PP) are simpler polymer structures that do not need plasticisers, although they do use additives such as UV and heat stabilisers, antioxidants and in some apllications flame retardants (DTI 1993). PP is often made using a chlorine intermediate process, though a viable non-chlorine process exists and should be used. The polyolefins pose fewer risks and have the highest potential for mechanical recycling. Both PE and PP are versatile and cheap, and can be designed to replace almost all PVC applications. PE can be made either hard, or very flexible, without the use of plasticisers, by modifying and cross linking the carbon chains. Newly developed catalysts for its production are further enhancing the widespread applications of polyolefins. PP is easy to mold and can also be used in a wide range of applications.
The raw materials ethylene and propylene used in these plastics are highly flammable and explosive, but relatively harmless for the environment. However, they are completely petroleum-based. The cracking of hydrocarbon feedstocks generates persistent organic pollutants, such as polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) (Norsk Hydro 1992). Halogenated flame retardants may be used in polyolefins as additives, but these should be replaced by more environmentally acceptable flame retardants, such as aluminium and magnesium hydroxides. Other additives include UV and heat stabilisers and anti-oxidants. Finally, the burning of these plastics can generate many volatile compounds, including formaldehyde and acetaldehyde, both suspected carcinogens (DTI 1993).
In comparison with PVC, PE and PP use fewer problematic additives, have reduced leaching potential in landfills, reduced potential for dioxin formation during burning (provided that brominated/chlorinated flame retardants are not used), and reduced technical problems and costs during recycling.
PET and PE/PP could replace other plastics, especially PVC, in the intermediate term. However their inability to fit within clean production criteria ultimately means they are less desirable than traditional (indigenous) materials if these were based on sustainable production and use and bio-based polymers. Traditional materials currently being replaced by plastics include paper bags, leaf packagings for food in Africa and India, clay containers for food and water, and natural local building materials.
5. Bio-based polymers: back to the future? The vast majority of plastics are based on non-renewable fossil fuels and are therefore by definition non-sustainable products. Biodegradable plastics from renewable sources (bio-based) are seen as a promising alternative for plastic products which have a short life cycle or are impractical to recycle, such as food packaging, agricultural plastics and other disposables. The degradation products can be re-used (methanol, methane) and the biomass can be downcycled to soil-carbon, which leads to a closed carbon cycle (Smits 1996).
Biodegradable plastics are defined by the International Standards Organisation (ISO) as plastics in which the degradation results from the action of micro-organisms such as bacteria, fungi and algae. Biodegradable plastics can still be petroleum-based and should not be mistaken for bio-based plastics.
Bio-based plastics can be made out of products obtained from raw materials produced by a natural living or growing systems, such as starch and cellulose, or those made via biotechnological processes (Smits 1996). The advantage of bio-polymers is that they readily degrade and can be composted. Natural polymers include cellulose (from wood, cotton), horn (hardened protein) and raw rubber. Converted natural polymers include vulcanised rubber, vulcanised fibre, celluloid and casein protein. An example of a biotechnological process is Biopol, a bio-plastic made from chemicals produced by bacteria fed on sugar (Monsanto 1996). It is essential, however, that the production of bio-based plastics does not involve the use of genetically modified organisms or allow the patenting of life.
Clean production. Ultimately we need to adopt a clean production approach to the design and choice of materials in product manufacturing. Clean Production systems are ‘circular’ - i.e. the ‘loop’ is closed - and therefore they use fewer materials and less water and energy. Recycling wastes from the production process and from post-consumer products is a fundamental step in conserving material flows. However, to achieve this, recycling should involve non-hazardous materials and truly decrease the need for virgin material inputs.