2 minute read
Shred Make Use Repeat
Plastic recycling program offers building block to change.
An innovative program taking shape at Fanshawe’s St. Thomas/Elgin Regional Campus aspires to tackle a persistent challenge facing society: plastic waste.
“We want to take care of our own plastic waste in a closed-loop recycling system: shred, make, use, repeat,” says Jennifer Ewans, professor and coordinator of the campus’ Construction Project Management program, noting that only approximately nine per cent of the three million tonnes of plastic thrown away every year in Canada is recycled.
Over the past year, with the support of a Fanshawe Research and Innovation Fund grant, Jennifer has been leading a team of faculty and students from a wide range of programs to successfully undertake the first step in the process by fabricating a shredder that mechanically reduces ordinary plastic waste (e.g., water bottles) into small pellets which can be used to produce something useful.
Over the next two years, with the support of a $50,000 grant from the College’s Innovation Fund, the focus will shift primarily to the next steps in the equation.
The team is working on an extruder capable of heating the plastic pellets and injecting the melted plastic into molds to create anything from toothbrushes and sunglasses to more environmentally sustainable construction materials, and incorporating a Western University-designed sheet press which would allow for the creation of larger products.
The project will incorporate Fanshawe’s Advanced Business and Industry Solutions to perform stress and environmental testing on all its new prototypes.
When fully scaled, the project would make Fanshawe the first post-secondary institution in Canada to take care of its own plastic waste. More importantly, it would establish a blueprint for other institutions, neighbourhoods and businesses to reduce and repurpose plastic waste that fuels local development and stimulates a circular economy.
How much is 3 million tonnes of plastic?
It’s the equivalent of 22 football fields covered in plastic waste to a height of six storeys.
