Algorithm for solving one of the tasks of the closed-loop economies – how to return municipal solid waste made of plastic to production

Abstract

The article deals with the analysis of data published by the Federal Service for State Statistics (Rosstat) regarding the whole Russia and regarding Moscow and presented in the form of the federal statistical observation No. 2-TP (waste) “Information on the formation, processing, utilization, neutralization, disposal of waste production and consumption”. The results of the analysis of the data adduced in the Rosstat report show that the situation with the separate waste collection, its processing and sorting for further utilization including recycling cannot be called satisfactory in Russia and its capital city. The author chooses Moscow to study the reasons and improve the situation. This is caused by the fact that the Rosstat data depict the average picture for the country as the nature conditions, the specificities of the people’s habitation and, consequently, the state of management of solid municipal waste in different regions of the country vary greatly and depend on the peculiar feature of each region. The author of the article studies the ways of solving the existing in the capital city problems connected with the need for improving the situation in the management of municipal solid waste. The most difficult segment from the viewpoint of growing volumes of waste disposal is non-rotting solid municipal waste, plastics, which are classified into two categories: recyclable and non-recyclable plastic waste. This segment has been chosen for the author’s study. Within the recyclable category the polyethylene packaging (PET containers) is identified as the most voluminous when collecting waste and as quite suitable for recycling among plastic solid municipal waste. The author calculates the proportion of PET containers in the generated municipal solid waste, indicates economic and environmental efficiency of packaging recycling and its return to production, and suggests optimal ways of collecting and delivering waste for recycling. The results obtained during the study has become the basis for developing the algorithm for the return to the production of municipal solid waste in PET containers.