Chemical and mechanical recycling of shredder fluff
Each year, the secondary metals industry recovers about 55--60 million tons of prompt and obsolete scrap which is used in the production of finished steel products. The single largest source of this scrap is the obsolete automobile. The shredder industry recovers about 10--12 million ton/yr of ferrous scrap, most of which is from shredded automobiles. However, for each ton of steel recovered, over 500 lb of fluff are produced. Shredder fluff is comprised of the nonmetallic content of the automobile and other shredded materials, such as refrigerators, dryers, and dishwashers, which are commonly called white goods. The plastics content of shredder fluff is typically about 15--20% by weight and is expected to increase over the next decade due to the significant increase in the use of automotive plastics over the past 10--15 years. At present, shredder fluff is landfilled. The rapidly escalating landfilling cost, along with environmental concerns over the fate of this waste, poses a significant cost and liability to the shredder industry. Research is being carried out to identify and develop recycling technologies that will reduce the volume and the mass of shredder fluff going to landfills and to minimize its cost impact on the recycling of secondary metals. Previous research has focused on exploiting the plastics content of shredder fluff and other hydrocarbons present in fluff for secondary recycling (e.g., production of wood-products substitutes) and for quaternary recycling (e.g., energy generation). Limited work was also conducted on tertiary recycling (e.g., pyrolysis and gasification). Although the previous research has established the technical feasibility of most, if not all, of the alternatives that were examined, none have proven to be cost-effective. This paper describes some research at Argonne National Laboratory (ANL) to develop a process to recycle some of the fluff content, primarily the thermoplastics.
- Research Organization:
- Argonne National Lab., IL (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE; USDOE, Washington, DC (United States)
- DOE Contract Number:
- W-31109-ENG-38
- OSTI ID:
- 7141246
- Report Number(s):
- ANL/ES/CP-77925; CONF-9210244-1; ON: DE93004186
- Resource Relation:
- Conference: Pollution prevention conference iron and steel industry, Chicago, IL (United States), 14-15 Oct 1992
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
Similar Records
End-of-life vehicle recycling : state of the art of resource recovery from shredder residue.
A chemical approach to recycling mixed plastics from shredder fluff
Related Subjects
54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES
SCRAP
RECYCLING
THERMOPLASTICS
AUTOMOBILES
DISHWASHERS
DRYERS
LAND POLLUTION ABATEMENT
MATERIALS RECOVERY
SOLVENT EXTRACTION
WASTE PROCESSING
EXTRACTION
MANAGEMENT
MATERIALS
ORGANIC COMPOUNDS
ORGANIC POLYMERS
PETROCHEMICALS
PETROLEUM PRODUCTS
PLASTICS
POLLUTION ABATEMENT
POLYMERS
PROCESSING
SEPARATION PROCESSES
SOLID WASTES
SYNTHETIC MATERIALS
VEHICLES
WASTE MANAGEMENT
WASTES
320305* - Energy Conservation
Consumption
& Utilization- Industrial & Agricultural Processes- Industrial Waste Management
540220 - Environment
Terrestrial- Chemicals Monitoring & Transport- (1990-)