About 79% of all plastic waste ends up in landfill or as litter. The TRANSFORM-CE research project’s objective is to help find better uses for thousands of tonnes of plastic waste in North West Europe. To achieve this goal, TRANSFORM-CE is working with several companies and students. Four new student projects, whose goal is the high quality recycling of plastic, started last September.
At the beginning of September, 21 students started working on various projects for the TRANSFORM-CE research project. Technical Management, the Built Environment, Mechanical Engineering and Electrical Engineering students will work on various aspects of plastics recycling. One project will examine plastic recycling in circular cities. In this project, students will work on useful applications of recycled plastic in municipalities or regions. An inventory will be made of potential municipalities, waste streams will be analysed, and opportunities for collaboration will be examined.
A second project will be done in conjunction with Reflower, a company that offers a subscription service for artificial flowers as a sustainable alternative to fresh flowers. For Reflower, students will look into, one, whether plastic flowers can be reused when they have reached the end of their lives and, two, at the most suitable types of vases.
A third project will work with Sealed Cycle to assess how waste streams can be improved by using ‘Smart bin’ waste containers that accurately separate the waste using Artificial Intelligence. Students will examine waste streams, potential markets and test a first prototype.
Finally, in collaboration with the Green Office and Enactus, work will continue on a Precious Plastic recycle machine which will convert the waste of Hogeschool Utrecht into valuable products. In this project, the students will optimise the current machine with the objective of presenting a good quality end product in January 2022.
For more information about the student project or the TRANSFORM-CE project, please contact: malou.vandervegt@hu.nl.