Places and Causes of Mismanaged Plastic Materials in the Life Cycle of Flexible Plastic Packaging Based on Mechanical Recycling Context

Abstract

Plastic waste has become a big issue in the world for its large amount of plastic waste in the sea. Most of the plastic waste is plastic packaging which consists of flexible and rigid plastic packaging. This research discusses flexible plastic packaging. Until now, most researches on the loss of plastic materials discuss how to manage plastic waste disposal once it has been used by community: only a few discuss production cycle: while none of them discusses flexible plastic packaging area. This research aims to examine the number of mismanaged materials throughout flexible plastic packaging life cycle using a combination of Material Flow Analysis (MFA) and Life Cycle Analysis (LCA). Based on the literature review, interviews and observations conducted by the author to all stakeholders in the life cycle of flexible plastic packaging, mismanagement of plastic material occurred in each cycle, mostly caused by quality degradation of flexible plastic that could cause plastic waste was not acceptable in the mechanical recycle. The results of this study show that: (1) mismanaged material occurred in all cycles throughout the life cycles of flexible plastic packaging, (2) quality degradation is the main caused of mismanaged material in several cycles, and (3) the mismanaged materials in the life cycle of flexible plastic packaging were 98.29%.