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tubing and intravenous fluid bags. Norwich Plastics has been working with hospitals for decades, but in 2020 launched the PVC-123 Medical Vinyl recycling program with Canadian hospitals and medical and ambulatory facilities near its recycling facility in Ontario, Canada. Most recently, Norwich Plastics and Rochester Regional Health System (in New York state, just across the US border) launched the MediVinyl+ Clean PVC Medical Reclaim and Recycling pilot program and will use a VI Viability grant to conduct hospital personnel training, install material handling equipment at a health system location, and recycle the collected materials. “Logistics is the crux of any post-consumer


recycling program,” says Persaud. “One of the challenges is to identify devices where the PVC can be easily separated from the non-PVC components. This problem is an opportunity for medical device designers to use materials that can be recycled together. Various components could all be made from PVC or from materials that are compatible with PVC recycling, such as LLDPE, rather than polycar- bonate or engineering resins that must be removed.” Persaud adds that US hospitals are different from those in Canada in structure and protocol. “With the VI grant, we are aiming to identify how the differ- ences between US and Canadian hospitals will affect recycling, so that we can develop a document for VI that explains the challenges and what can be done. We hope the program can then be applied in other locations.” The subsequent recyclate can be used in a variety of applications, typically non-cos- metic, non-contact, durable goods. Medical PVC recycling projects are underway


around the world, and are well established in Australia, for example. In Europe, the VinylPlus Med pilot project in Belgium was launched as a collaboration between VinylPlus, the Renewi waste management company and recycler Raff Plastics to recycle discarded, non-infectious single-use PVC from locations such as hospitals. As of mid-2023,


Left: Mixing of compounded raw materials for testing and approval


IMAGE: i2M


the project had 17 hospitals in its program. VinylPlus reports that the recyclates can be repro- cessed into wall covering or flooring for the healthcare sector, for example. A challenge for flexible PVC is that it contains plasticisers, and the types of plasticisers used and allowed in the EU have changed over the years (also see above). Recycled material needed to be checked for the presence of certain orthophthalate plasticisers (eg DEHP). A portable near-infrared scanner developed by Italian company Phoenix to distinguish PVC from other polymers was further developed to detect DEHP so that any materials containing this additive type can be sorted out.


CLICK ON THE LINKS FOR MORE INFORMATION: � www.vinylplus.eu � www.recovinyl.com � www.eppa-profiles.eu � www.vinylinfo.org � https://vinylroofs.org (CFFA) � www.vinylsiding.org � www.revinylizenow.org � www.i2m.com � https://norwichplastics.com � https://pvcmed.org/ (VinylPlus Med) � www.phoenix-rto.com � www.benvic.com


Recycling pharma blister packaging IMAGE: VINYLPLUS


A new VinyPlus initiative in Germany seeks to recycle pre-consumer pharmaceutical blister packaging, made from rigid PVC composite films and aluminum foil. Two German PVC film manufacturers, Liveo Research and Perlen Packaging, have teamed up with two recycling partners, Hundhausen Kunststofftechnik and Neidhardt Rohstoff. The recycling process takes the composite punched grids made during package manufacturing and separates and mills the PVC and alumini- um fractions. The initiative reports that from the 10,000 tonnes of composite punched grids generated each year, approximately 2,000 tonnes of aluminium and 6,500 tonnes of PVC can be recovered.


www.plasticsrecyclingworld.com January/February 2024 | PLASTICS RECYCLING WORLD 33


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