Quantifying High Density Polyethylene Flows in the United States using Material Flow Analysis

Published

August 20, 2024

Author(s)

Abheek Chatterjee, Nehika Mathur, Daniel Figola, Matthew Triebe, Buddhika Hapuwatte, Ashley Hartwell, Katherine Morris

Abstract

A Circular Economy (CE) aims to reduce natural resource consumption, waste generation, and related detrimental environmental, social, and economic impacts by retaining valuable materials in the economy as long as possible. This research focuses on the implementation of CE for High-density polyethylene (HDPE) plastics. Recycled HDPE retains desirable properties such as high durability, flexibility, and corrosion resistance leading to a high demand for recycled HDPE by piping and other building and construction industries. Unfortunately, most HDPE comprising products are mismanaged at their end-of-use (EoU) resulting in significant HDPE stocks being incinerated, landfilled, or disposed of in water bodies. This mismanagement of EoU HDPE products contributes to the plastics waste crisis, leads to deleterious environmental and human health impacts, and further reinforces an unsustainable linear economy model. Therefore, improved plastic waste collection mechanisms are needed to keep the different plastic polymer waste streams segregated and to enable the implementation of efficient recovery processes, particularly for recyclable plastics such as HDPE. A challenge in developing end-of-use infrastructure for HDPE recovery is the knowledge gap related to the systematic accounting of HDPE flows. Material Flow Analysis (MFA) provides the means to track the stocks and flows of a resource within a defined system. This paper investigates HDPE flows in the United States (US) economy and presents two static MFA models for the years 2015 and 2019. The results of the analysis revealed that less than 10% of the HDPE produced in the US was recovered through recycling in 2015 and 2019. Based on the available data, EoU packaging and container goods are identified as the primary source for recycled HDPE. Our analysis also revealed discrepancies in historical data about HDPE flow across different industry sectors and life-cycle stages. To overcome limitations associated with data unavailability, HDPE flows for the MFA models were computed based on assumptions discussed in the paper. The availability of more granular data (that includes HDPE flows through industry sectors and sub-sectors) would lead to a more thorough MFA. By providing the static MFA models of HDPE flows and stocks in 2015 and 2019 in the US economy, and identifying specific data collection needs, this investigation takes the first step towards a comprehensive characterization of HDPE flows in the US. Quantifying and characterizing HDPE flows is an important component of anticipating the availability of secondary HDPE feedstocks, scaling up recovery infrastructure adequately, and contributing to our overall understanding of the current and future secondary HDPE market dynamics.

Proceedings Title

Proceedings of the 2024 ASME Manufacturing Science and Engineering Conference

Conference Dates

June 17-21, 2024

Conference Location

Knoxville, TN, US

Conference Title

2024 ASME Manufacturing Science and Engineering Conference

Pub Type

Conferences

Download Paper

https://doi.org/10.1115/MSEC2024-125254

Local Download

Keywords

High-density polyethylene, Circular Economy, Material Flow Analysis, Waste management

Citation

Chatterjee, A. , Mathur, N. , Figola, D. , Triebe, M. , Hapuwatte, B. , Hartwell, A. and Morris, K. (2024), Quantifying High Density Polyethylene Flows in the United States using Material Flow Analysis, Proceedings of the 2024 ASME Manufacturing Science and Engineering Conference, Knoxville, TN, US, [online], https://doi.org/10.1115/MSEC2024-125254, https://tsapps.nist.gov/publication/get_pdf.cfm?pub_id=957016 (Accessed February 11, 2025)