Decontamination and recycling of agrochemical plastic packaging waste

Picuno, Caterina; Alassali, Ayah; Sundermann, Michel; Godosi, Zoe; Picuno, Pietro; Kuchta, Kerstin

doi:10.1016/j.jhazmat.2019.120965

Cited by 38 publications

(21 citation statements)

References 24 publications

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“…Recycling can mean “bringing back empty containers to the dealership,” or it can also indicate “reusing the containers for other purposes.” Either way, analyses of used containers have shown that regular triple rinsing options are insufficient for decontamination of containers, implying that any kind of reuse or recycling in a low resource setting is inappropriate. 68 To reduce the environmental footprint of pesticide use, it is important to look beyond the application of the chemicals, and improve the residue and waste management conducted by the farmer, like equipment cleaning and container disposal, without forgetting to reduce the pesticides introduced into the environment through spraying, drift, and runoff. 69…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Comparative Analysis of Pesticide Use Determinants Among Smallholder Farmers From Costa Rica and Uganda

Staudacher

Fuhrimann

Farnham

et al. 2020

Environ�Health�Insights

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Pesticides are used globally in agriculture and pose a threat to the health of farmers, communities, and the environment. Smallholder farmers in low- and middle-income countries have generally a low socio-economic status and educational level. Consequently, they are particularly vulnerable to negative impacts of pesticides on their health, yields, or land. In a Knowledge, Attitude, and Practices study, we compared the pest management practices between a market-oriented farming system in Zarcero County, Costa Rica, and a subsistence-based farming system in Wakiso District, Uganda. We conducted a cross-sectional survey among smallholder farmers from Costa Rica (n = 300) in 2016 and from Uganda (n = 302) in 2017. We enrolled conventional and organic farmers, but also farmers with mixed practices and non-applicators of any pest management strategy. We found that the majority of pesticides used in both case studies are classified as highly hazardous by the World Health Organization. While more than 90% of smallholder farmers from both countries were aware of the negative health effects of pesticide exposure, <11% in Costa Rica and <2% in Uganda reported using personal protective equipment every time they handled or applied pesticides. Hygiene and other safe use practices were not adopted by all farmers (<61%), especially among farmers applying more hazardous pesticides. Conventional farmers from Costa Rica (14%) and Uganda (19%) reported disposing pesticide residuals into rivers. Using a logistic regression we found that organic farmers were more likely to having been trained on safe pesticide use practices. Using a robust regression, we observed that smallholder household income was primarily driven by education and not directly by the use of synthetic pesticides. Our results suggest that negative effects of pesticides can be managed over the whole life cycle, from purchase, via storage and application to residual and waste management by fostering professionalization of farmers. We advise future safe use and handling interventions to consider the pesticide use-related socioeconomic and demographic findings highlighted in this paper.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Comparative Analysis of Pesticide Use Determinants Among Smallholder Farmers From Costa Rica and Uganda

Staudacher

Fuhrimann

Farnham

et al. 2020

Environ�Health�Insights

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“…The washing process is performed with water, without any addition of detergents or other surfactants. Such an approach should be considered environmentally friendly because it reduces the additional emissions of chemicals to the environment and reduces the extent of plastic decomposition during recycling [ 38 , 39 ]. Sample M1 is a waste material after the first washing-drying cycle, M2 after the second, and M3 after the third.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Wastes from Agricultural Silage Film Recycling Line as a Potential Polymer Materials

et al. 2021

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The recycling of plastics is currently one of the most significant industrial challenges. Due to the enormous amounts of plastic wastes generated by various industry branches, it is essential to look for potential methods for their utilization. In the presented work, we investigated the recycling potential of wastes originated from the agricultural films recycling line. Their structure and properties were analyzed, and they were modified with 2.5 wt % of commercially available compatibilizers. The mechanical and thermal performance of modified wastes were evaluated by tensile tests, thermogravimetric analysis, and differential scanning calorimetry. It was found that incorporation of such a small amount of modifiers may overcome the drawbacks caused by the presence of impurities. The incorporation of maleic anhydride-grafted compounds enhanced the tensile strength of wastes by 13–25%. The use of more ductile compatibilizers—ethylene-vinyl acetate and paraffin increased the elongation at break by 55–64%. The presence of compatibilizers also reduced the stiffness of materials resulting from the presence of solid particles. It was particularly emphasized for styrene-ethylene-butadiene-styrene and ethylene-vinyl acetate copolymers, which caused up to a 20% drop of Young’s modulus. Such effects may facilitate the further applications of analyzed wastes, e.g., in polymer film production. Thermal performance was only slightly affected by compatibilization. It caused a slight reduction in polyethylene melting temperatures (up to 2.8 °C) and crystallinity degree (up to 16%). For more contaminated materials, the addition of compatibilizers caused a minor reduction in the decomposition onset (up to 6 °C). At the same time, for the waste after three washing cycles, thermal stability was improved. Moreover, depending on the desired properties and application, materials do not have to go through the whole recycling line, simplifying the process, reducing energy and water consumption. The presented results indicate that it is possible to efficiently use the materials, which do not have to undergo the whole recycling process. Despite the presence of impurities, they could be applied in the manufacturing of products which do not require exceptional mechanical performance.

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“…As can be seen in Figure 2, from 2018 onwards, an increasing trend in the number of publications was recorded. A deep analysis indicates that the focus was on topics such as circular economy [25,[56][57][58][59][60][61], as well as the recycling of contaminated plastics (e.g., from e-waste and agricultural packaging) [15,24,[62][63][64][65][66][67][68][69][70][71][72]. to the literature review is to target some, yet not all, of the published scientific articles and online reports on the main topics of plastics recycling, circular economy of plastics, and challenges to plastic waste recycling.…”

Section: State-of-the-art In Literature and Trends Towards Plastic Recyclingmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…As can be seen in Figure 2, from 2018 onwards, an increasing trend in the number of publications was recorded. A deep analysis indicates that the focus was on topics such as circular economy [25,[56][57][58][59][60][61], as well as the recycling of contaminated plastics (e.g., from e-waste and agricultural packaging) [15,24,[62][63][64][65][66][67][68][69][70][71][72]. Analysing the topics "plastic recycling" and "circular economy" combined during the same lifespan (1950-2020) in the Web of Science Core Collection resulted in a total of 337 publications.…”

Section: State-of-the-art In Literature and Trends Towards Plastic Recyclingmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Existing patterns of plastics applications are creating global waste management problems, where plastic wastes have to be treated after their end-of-life. Plastic wastes transmit chemical additives, and despite the different treatment pathways, these additives are sooner or later transported and accumulated in the environment [15,[69][70][71]138,154,155].…”

Section: The Fate Of Additives In the Plastic Waste Streammentioning

confidence: 99%

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Towards Higher Quality of Recycled Plastics: Limitations from the Material’s Perspective

et al. 2021

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The increasing consumption of plastics and plastic products results in correspondingly substantial volumes of waste, which poses considerable environmental burdens. With the ongoing environmental actions, the application of circular economy on this waste stream is becoming inevitable. In this paper, the topics of plastics recycling, circular economy on plastics, and challenges to plastic waste recycling are critically reviewed. In the first part of this paper, the development of research on plastic recycling was viewed from 1950 until 2020 using the scientific database Web of Science, and 682 related studies were found and used to assess the changing research priorities along that timeline. The following sections discuss the potentials and requirements to enhance the quality of the produced recycled plastic, in connection with the factors that currently limit it. In conclusion, the quality of recycled plastic is generally determined by the homogeneity of the recovered plastic feed. There are various strategies which could be implemented to overcome the hindrances identified in the paper and to improve the quality of the recycled plastic, such as working on enhanced product designs for minimised waste heterogeneity and controlling the materials’ degree of contamination by applying advanced sorting.

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Decontamination and recycling of agrochemical plastic packaging waste

Cited by 38 publications

References 24 publications

Comparative Analysis of Pesticide Use Determinants Among Smallholder Farmers From Costa Rica and Uganda

Comparative Analysis of Pesticide Use Determinants Among Smallholder Farmers From Costa Rica and Uganda

Wastes from Agricultural Silage Film Recycling Line as a Potential Polymer Materials

Towards Higher Quality of Recycled Plastics: Limitations from the Material’s Perspective

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