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The Environmental Analysis of the Post-Use Management Scenarios of the Heat-Shrinkable Film
Summary
Researchers conducted a life cycle assessment of different post-use management options for heat-shrinkable plastic films, including recycling, landfilling, and incineration. Recycling consistently showed the lowest environmental impact—reducing potential impact by more than 50% compared to other disposal options—while improper disposal contributed to microplastic generation and greenhouse gas emissions.
The post-use management of plastic films, including shrink films, poses a significant environmental and technological challenge for the industry. Due to their durability and difficulty in degradation, these wastes contribute to environmental pollution, generating microplastics and greenhouse gas emissions during improper disposal. This paper examines different post-use management methods for shrink wrap, such as recycling, landfilling, and incineration, and assesses their impact on the environmental impact of the bottle packaging process using a life-cycle analysis (LCA). This study shows that the recycling option has the lowest potential environmental impact. Compared to other post-use management options, recycling reduces the potential environmental impact by more than 50%. The analysis also shows that the tested scenario using recycled film and photovoltaic energy has the lowest potential environmental impact. Using recycled film and powering the process with renewable energy reduces the potential environmental impact by about 95% compared to Scenario 1 and by about 85% in Scenario 3.
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