Abstract
Bioplastics demand has been increased globally due to concerns regarding environmentally friendly consumption and production. Polylactic acid (PLA), polyhydroxyalkanoates (PHAs), and polybutylene succinate (PBS) are promising bioplastics with bio-based feedstocks and property of biodegradability. They are produced by bacterial fermentation of sugars from carbohydrate sources. With flexibility in their properties, PLA, PHAs, and PBS can potentially substitute conventional plastics such as polypropylene (PP), polyethylene terephthalate (PET), and polystyrene (PS). This study aims at evaluating the environmental and economic sustainability of bioplastics production together with end-of-life (EOL) options. The combination of environmental and economic indicators, eco-efficiency (E/E), was selected to investigate the performance of PLA, PHAs, and PBS from sugarcane and cassava in comparison with PP. The environmental impacts were determined using life cycle assessment. The product cost was used to represent the economic value. The E/E results showed that the environmental and economic sustainability could be enhanced with 100% mechanical recycling of all kinds of studied plastics. It is also important to highlight that mechanical recycling showed a better performance in terms of E/E than composting of bioplastics.
Highlights
Generation of plastic waste is a global problem, one of the major problems being the accumulation of plastic waste in the ocean that has caught the attention of environmental agencies worldwide [1]
According to the market data of bioplastics provided by European Bioplastics, the global capacity of bioplastic production was 2.05 million tonnes in 2017, accounting for 0.6 percent of plastics produced
The materials studied in this paper are Polylactic acid (PLA), PHAs, polybutylene succinate (PBS), and PP
Summary
Generation of plastic waste is a global problem, one of the major problems being the accumulation of plastic waste in the ocean that has caught the attention of environmental agencies worldwide [1]. The production capacity of conventional plastics worldwide is about 320 million tonne annually [5]. According to the market data of bioplastics provided by European Bioplastics, the global capacity of bioplastic production was 2.05 million tonnes in 2017, accounting for 0.6 percent of plastics produced. An important point to consider is that the biomass feedstocks to be supplied to the bioplastics industry are being used to produce food, feed, and energy for domestic consumption. It may result in competition of the use of feedstocks and impacts on land and water use
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