Fast Forward: Can My 3D Printer Recycle My Water Bottle?

The plastic problem is a big one. Or a big opportunity, depending how you look at it.

According to the Government of Canada, Canadians throw away over 3 million tonnes of plastic waste every year. And only 9% of that is recycled.

“It is not sustainable for us to produce plastic in such vast quantities and think future generations will find a solution for our waste,” says Dr. Mohammad Arjmand, Canada Research Chair in Advanced Materials and Polymer Engineering and Assistant Professor at UBC Okanagan.

“We need to find the solution.”

Dr. Arjmand leads an interdisciplinary team of scientists and social scientists at the Plastic Recycling Research Cluster, whose aim is to advance plastic recycling.

“The reality is we can’t remove plastic from our daily lives,” he says. “But we might be able to contribute to reducing the amount of waste that’s generated as a result.”

One possibility Dr. Arjmand believes has great potential: using recycled plastic in 3D printing. By processing plastic waste into filaments that could be used in 3D printers, that would give it a second, highly functional life.

There are a few hurdles to this process. First, there are many different types of plastic—some of which are recyclable and some of which are not. Among those that are recyclable, there are different types with different melting temperatures so, Dr. Arjmand says, they cannot be efficiently processed together.

That’s where a combination of Artificial Intelligence and robotics comes in handy.

“Having an AI and robotic system separate and analyze the plastic is much more efficient and viable than having a human separate plastics by colour or number,” Dr. Arjmand says.

Let’s say, after those plastics are sorted, you end up with a clean, empty water bottle made of recyclable plastic. That could be put through a shredder and broken up into small beads, which could then be added to an extruder, which Dr. Arjmand describes as “like a meat-grinding machine.” The extruder generates filaments that could be used in a 3D printer.

Could this mean that at some point in the near future, we might have extruders in our own homes that we could feed our empty water bottles to be repurposed into filaments for our own 3D printing machines?

Not likely, says Dr. Arjmand.

“First, the extruders are expensive,” he says. But they would also pose safety hazards because they operate at about 150-300 degrees centigrade and generate fumes.

“They require a well-ventilated lab environment,” he says.

But it is entirely conceivable, Dr. Arjmand says, that you could purchase commercially made recycled plastic filament for use in a standard-issue home 3D printer. Or that recycled plastic filament could be used to supply advanced industries that would turn it into value-added products like those that could conduct electricity, for example.

“In that way,” he says, “We could transform end-of-life plastic End-of-life plasticPlastic items that have reached the conclusion of their useful or functional lifespan and are no longer in active use. Instead of being discarded as waste, innovative recycling efforts aim to transform end-of-life plastic into valuable resources, reducing environmental impact and contributing to a more sustainable future. from waste to wealth.”

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