Appendix III: Research projects enabling recycling of plastic containing halogenated flame retardants and ATO

• Author: Clemm, Christan; Löw, Clara; Baron, Yifaat; Moch, Katja; Möller, Martin; Köhler, Andreas R; Gensch, Carl-Otto; Deubzer, Otmar
• Pages: 78-78

RoHS Annex II Dossier, final

Diantimony trioxide (flame retardant)

78

14 Appendix III: Research projects enabling recycling of plastic containing

halogenated flame retardants and ATO

The input of Campine and i2a during the 2nd stakeholder consultation points out several research

projects that aims to mechanically recycle plastics with the combination of ATO with halogens, e.g.

•Life PlasPLUS - Recycling of high-quality secondary thermoplastics and critical raw materials

coming from mixed WEEE and EoL vehicles; a project in the EU funded LIFE programme: Life 18

ENV/BE/000368;

https://ec.europa.eu/environment/life/project/Projects/index.cfm?fuseaction=search.dspPage&n_

proj_id=7189

The project aims to scale up a new froth flotation/triboelectricity prototype to sort flame retardant

plastics and separate fibre-reinforced plastic at the Italian recycling plant of Comet Traitements

plant into added-value thermoplastic streams by demonstration unit.

•A project “PLAST2bCLEANED” started recently in November 2019

(https://plast2bcleaned.eu/): The project is about chemical recycling of WEEE plastics with

removal of Br and ATO.

•The “PolyStyreneLoop” targets EPS building waste contaminated with HBCD and target a

chemical recycling of the polymer; the project tis funded in the EU LIFE programme and runs from

2017 until 2021;

https://ec.europa.eu/environment/life/project/Projects/index.cfm?fuseaction=search.dspPage&n_

proj_id=6263 and also at: https://www.ivv.fraunhofer.de/en/recycling-environment/recycling-of-

contaminated-plastics/polystyreneloop.html.

•The project “CreaTor” targets to remove hazardous, already banned bromine- containing flame-

retardants from waste streams using continuous purification technologies: supercritical CO2 and

cost-effective solvent-based processes using natural deep eutectic solvents (NADES) in twin-

screw extruders; https://www.creatorproject.eu/about/. The project is funded under the EU Horizon

2020 research and innovation programme under Grant Agreement no. 820477.

•According to Campine, there are also initiatives to alter the incineration process with energy

recovering to optimise the recuperation of ATO and Br, e.g. by KULeuven.

•KULeuven (2018) on the NLPR project: Next Level Plastic recycling project funded by the Flemish

government has demonstrated that: It is technically feasible to sort out plastic components based

on the presence of bromine and antimony and to mechanically recycle these plastics maintaining

both good mechanical and flame-retardant properties. Ongoing analysis are currently investigating

the presence of deca brominated flame retardants in the waste stream of LCD TV plastics for

which a pilot line to sort these plastics on a component level has recently been implemented.