The problem of plastic waste and the issues that accompany it are a pressing concern for global sustainability, thus motivating us to move towards a circular economy. Current plastic strategies rely on a linear economy in which plastic is used once before entering the waste disposal system. While improvements have been made to waste processing technologies and efficiencies, additives in plastics hamper their recyclability in mixed-stream recycling. These additives have not yet been tracked on a large scale, nor have their migrations to the different environmental compartments (air, water, and land) been quantified. In this study, the End-of-Life Plastic and Additive Flow Tracker (EoLPAFT) Tool with a graphical user interface (GUI) was created to estimate the releases of chemical additives throughout the life cycle of plastic, including investigations of the three principal end-of-life (EoL) options: recycling, incineration, and landfilling.
1,2 This tool utilizes data from the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) National Overview: Facts and Figures on Materials, Waste and Recycling.
3 It is also designed to allow users to enter custom datasets reflecting unique municipal solid waste (MSW) scenarios and scales. To demonstrate the applicability of this tool, two potential EoL management directive case studies are examined. The first shows the effects of extended producer responsibility (EPR), in which manufacturers are required to reclaim some of the waste produced from their products. The second case study investigates the effects of recycled plastic and additive accumulation throughout the life cycle loops if that plastic is repeatedly recycled. The goal of this tool is to aid decision makers in understanding the environmental effects of the EoL streams they manage and to allow them to create more informed, cost-effective, and sustainable EoL management strategies.
Disclaimer: The views expressed in this abstract are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the views or policies of the EPA.
1 https://yenkiekm.com/
2 https://github.com/jdchea95/EoLPAFT
3 US EPA, OLEM. “National Overview: Facts and Figures on Materials, Wastes and Recycling.” Overviews and Factsheets. https://www.epa.gov/facts-and-figures-about-materials-waste-and-recycli….
AIChE 2025 Abstract, 11/02-06/2025, Boston, MA
Chea. J.D., Conway, M., Ruiz-Mercado G. J, and Yenkie, K. M., “An End-of-Life Plastic and Additive Flow Tracker Tool for Scenario Forecasting,” Industrial & Engineering Chemistry Research (In Review), 2025.
