Available online at www.sciencedirect.

com

ScienceDirect
Energy Procedia 107 (2017) 222 226

3rd International Conference on Energy and Environment Research, ICEER 2016, 7-11 September
2016, Barcelona, Spain

Municipal Plastic Waste Composition Study at Transfer Station of

Bangkok and Possibility of its Energy Recovery by Pyrolysis
Chinnathan Areepraserta,*, Jarudej Asingsamanuntb, Supachot Srisawatb, Jeerattikul
Kaharna, Bundit Inseemeesaka, Phatavee Phaseea, Chanoknunt Khaobanga, Wichai
Siwakosita, Chart Chiemchaisrib
a
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Kasetsart University, 50 Ngam Wong Wan Rd., Ladyao, Chatuchak, Bangkok
10900, Thailand.
b
Department of Environmental Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Kasetsart University, 50 Ngam Wong Wan Rd., Ladyao, Chatuchak,
Bangkok 10900, Thailand.

Abstract

The pyrolysis of waste plastic was performed based on the characterization of municipal plastic waste (MPW) from one of
Bangkok citys waste transfer station. Results showed that heating value of oil product (49, 47, 43, and 42 MJ/kg, from LDPE,
mixture of HDPE and LDPE, PP and HDPE, respectively) was significantly higher than that of the raw plastic waste. Yield of the
oil product from the pyrolysis of LDPE was highest (60%). Energy recovery from plastic via pyrolysis was 75%, 59%, 50%, and
49% for LDPE, mixture of HDPE and LDPE, PP, and HDPE, respectively. Results from GC-MS of pyrolysis oil showed that
different raw materials produced very different sets of chemical compounds, with alkanes and alkenes found in the pyrolysis oil.
2017
2016TheTheAuthors.
Authors. Published
Published by Elsevier
by Elsevier Ltd. Ltd.
This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license
Peer-review under responsibility of the scientific committee of the 3rd International Conference on Energy and Environment
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
Research. under responsibility of the scientific committee of the 3rd International Conference on Energy and Environment Research.
Peer-review

Keywords: Municipal plastic waste; HDPE; LDPE; pyrolysis; energy recovery.

* Corresponding author. Tel.: +66-2797-0999; fax: +66-2579-2775.

E-mail address: achinatun@gmail.com

1876-6102 2017 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
Peer-review under responsibility of the scientific committee of the 3rd International Conference on Energy and Environment Research.
doi:10.1016/j.egypro.2016.12.132
 Chinnathan Areeprasert et al. / Energy Procedia 107 (2017) 222 226 223

1. Introduction

Municipal plastic waste (MPW) has a considerable share in the composition of Municipal solid waste (MSW) in
both developed and developing countries as shown in Fig. 1 [1-5]. The plastic waste in developed nation would
undergo well-established material recycling processes. For example, Japan has a great reputation in waste
management system including source separation practice as well as reutilization of plastic waste such as bottle and
packaging [6]. On the other hand, this behavior was not adopted in developing countries. Thus, plastic material that
would have some values in term of material recycling and energy recovery was available at the transfer station and
final disposal site. Without source separation practice, plastic waste at the site would be contaminated and difficult
for material recycling. Therefore, energy recovery from plastic could be applied to bring back the value of the
material left for disposal.

Fig. 1. Share of plastic waste in municipal solid waste of several countries with its waste generation per capita per day [1-5].

Incineration could recover energy from plastic waste by producing high pressure and temperature steam for
power generation via steam turbine generator. However, it would need large amount of daily waste as well as a huge
capital investment for construction work. This would not be feasible for small city, especially in developing
countries where funding is tremendously difficult and public acceptance on incineration is poor. Thus, nowadays,
pyrolysis technology gained a lot of attentions since it could convert plastic waste into oil that could be used as
crude oil for further upgrading, distillation, or directly utilized with other conventional fossil fuels. This technology
is adaptable at a community scale and requires significantly lower amount of budget compared to the incineration.
This paper focused on municipal plastic waste (MPW) composition at transfer station and energy recovery by
pyrolysis. Firstly, composition study of MPW was performed at the transfer station so that the appropriate type of
plastic could be chosen for the pyrolysis test. After obtaining the sample from the transfer station, pyrolysis of
several types of MPW was done. The product oil was subjected to heating value analysis and analyzed by GC-MS.
Product distribution was calculated to finally obtain energy recovery rate from the pyrolysis of plastic waste.

2. Material and methods

2.1. Sampling of municipal plastic waste

Sampling of municipal plastic waste (MPW) was done at the Nongkhaem transfer station in Bangkok, Thailand.
Sampling sources was bulk municipal solid waste (MSW) from the day-to-day unloaded waste truck. The sampling
process was done in both weekday and weekend to reduce the effect of consumption behavior. The classification of
plastic type was performed according to the Resin Identification Code (RIC) system designed for material recycling
and recovery by the Society of the Plastics Industry, namely, (1) Polyethylene terephthalate (PET), (2) High-density
224 Chinnathan Areeprasert et al. / Energy Procedia 107 (2017) 222 226

polyethylene (HDPE), (3) Polyvinyl chlorine (PVC), (4) Low-density polyethylene (LDPE), (5) Polypropylene (PP),
(6) Polystyrene (PS), and (7) OTHER (acrylic, nylon, polycarbonate, polylactic acid). After MSW was unloaded,
pile of MSW was flatted and grouped randomly. This subsampling was utilized for composition study. In total,
MPW sampling was approximately 140 kg in total from 44 subsampling. The observation period was in Novermber
and December 2015. This composition study was done twice for both weekday and weekend (four days in total).
After the composition study, MPW was taken back to the laboratory for material analysis and pyrolysis test. Prior to
the pyrolysis tests, MPW was dried in an electric oven at 105 C for 48 h. Then, the sample was cut into small pieces
(approximately 5x5 mm.). For the analysis, the dried sample was grinded and subjected to heating value analysis
(ASTM standard D-2015) by a bomb calorimeter (model 1341 EE by Parr Instrument Company).

2.2. Pyrolyzer

Based on the composition study described later, the major composition of MPW, namely (1) HDPE (2) LDPE (3)
PP and (4) mixture of HDPE and LDPE at the ratio of 2 to 1, was chosen as raw material for pyrolysis experiment.
Lab-scale pyrolyzer was utilized in this study. Its schematic is shown in Fig. 2. The reactor and its cover were made
from stainless steel 316 and the internal diameter of the pyrolysis chamber was 0.6 mm. The height of the pyrolyzer
was 380 mm including the cover. The 8 kW electric furnace was utilized as heat source. To start the experiment, 50
g of plastic sample was filled in the reactor and nitrogen gas was continuously supplied to ensure inert condition
during the experiment. The flow rate of nitrogen gas was set at 200 ml/min. The heating rate of the pyrolysis test
was 50 C/min. The target temperature was 600 C and the residence time for each pyrolysis test was 30 min
excluding heating period. The product oil from the oil trap was weighed and subjected to heating value analysis for
energy recovery. Moreover, the pyrolysis oil was analyzed by gas chromatography mass spectrometry (GC-MS
Shimadzu QP2010 Plus) to obtain its composition. The oven temperature of GC was 1 min at 50 C then heated to
280 C with the rate of 5 C/min and held for 10 min. Helium (99.999%) was used as carrier gas. Injection
temperature was 250 C and maintained at 280 C.

a b

Fig. 2. Pyrolyzer and oil collecting equipment: (a) Schematics; (b) Reactor.

3. Results and discussion

3.1. Composition of municipal plastic waste

Fig. 3 shows MPW distribution. Major composition of MPW at one of the Bangkok citys waste transfer station
observed was HDPE, LDPE, and PP. PET, OTHER, and PS types of plastic showed significant amount as well
whereas PVC had the lowest contribution. For the HDPE, it was from plastic shopping and waste bag while the
LDPE and PP were from plastic bag and food packaging. This was the reason why HDPE, LDPE, and PP were
chosen to do the pyrolysis experiment. Furthermore, the mixture of HDPE and LDPE was also subjected to the
experiment because the segregation of plastic bag was tremendously difficult in a practical way.
 Chinnathan Areeprasert et al. / Energy Procedia 107 (2017) 222 226 225

Fig. 3. Composition of municipal plastic waste (MPW) by weight.

Table 1. Lower heating value (LHV) of raw material and product and energy recovery.
Raw Oil product LHV of oil product
Type of plastic Energy recovery from oil product (%)
LHV (kJ/kg) LHV (kJ/kg) Miandad et al. [7]
PET 21,285 N/A N/A N/A
HDPE 34,105 42,139 49.4 41.45
LDPE 38,945 49,148 75.7 38-39
PP 42,427 42,799 50.4 45
PS 39,137 N/A N/A N/A
Mixture (HDPE : LDPE = 2:1) 35,718 46,845 59.0 40-40.5

3.2. Energy recovery from plastic waste via pyrolysis

Two important factors used to determined energy recovery are product yield and heating value in the product.
Product yield from the pyrolysis experiment is illustrated in Fig. 4. The highest oil yield was from pyrolysis of
LDPE (60% by weight) followed by PP (50% by weight), the mixture of HDPE and LDPE (45% by weight), and
HDPE (40% by weight), respectively. Solid char was observed from the experiment of the HDPE and its mixture.
The rest of their composition was in gas phase, which could be recovered as fuel to reduce energy consumption for
pyrolysis process itself. Lower heating value (LHV) of raw plastics, oil products and energy recovery rate were
shown in Table 1 compared with results from the study of Miandad et al [7]. It should be noted that the energy
recovery rate shown in this study did not considered energy input for the pyrolysis process. Therefore, the number
could be used solely as a guidance. It was observed that LHV of pyrolysis oil was significantly higher than that of its
raw material, except for PP whose HV was marginally increased. Regardless of solid products (char/ash) and
gaseous product analysis, LDPE would give highest energy recovery due to its highest yield and energy density.
In a practical way of implementation, mixture of HDPE and LDPE should be focused. Its result was somewhat
satisfied even though the energy recovery was reduced. Clearly, this was the effect of adding low LHV and low
yield raw materials (but large contribution in plastic composition), HDPE.

3.3. Chemical composition of pyrolysis oil

From GC-MS, a group of substances that could be found in HDPE-derived oil was, for example, Pentanol
(C5H12O), Cyclopentene (C5H8), Phenol (C6H6O), Cyclohexan (C6H12), Decane (C10H22), Tetradecane (C14H30),
Pentadecanol (C15H32O), Hexadecene (C16H32), Octadecanol (C18H38O), Octadecane (C18H38), and Nonadecene
(C19H38). The chemical composition of pyrolysis oil from LDPE was Hexane (C6H14), Heptanol (C7H16O), Heptane
(C7H16), Nonane (C9H20), Decane (C10H22), Decanal (C10H20O), Undecane (C11H24), Undecanal (C11H22O),
Dodecanal (C12H24O), Dodecanol (C12H26O), Pentadecane (C15H32), Pentadecene (C15H30), Pentadecanol (C15H32O),
Hexadecanal (C16H32O), Heptadecane (C17H36), Octadecane (C18H38), Eicosane (C20H42), Docosane (C22H46), and
Tetracosane (C24H50). For the oil from PP, the observed compositions were Pentene (C5H10), Cyclopentane (C5H10),
Cyclohexane (C6H12), Cyclohexanol (C6H12O), Octane (C8H18), Octanol (C8H18O), Nonenal (C9H16O), Undecene
226 Chinnathan Areeprasert et al. / Energy Procedia 107 (2017) 222 226

(C11H22), Dodecane (C12H26), Dodecenol (C12H26O), Tridecanol (C13H28O), Tetradecanol (C14H30O), Tetradecane
(C14H30), Hexadecanol (C16H34O), Hexadecane (C16H34), Heptadecane (C17H36), Octadecene (C18H36), Nonadecane
(C19H40), and Eicosane (C20H42). For the mixture of HDPE and LDPE, pyrolysis oil was, for instance, Hexane
(C6H14), Nonane (C9H20), Decane (C10H22), Decanal (C10H20O), Undecane (C11H24), Undecanal (C11H22O),
Tridecane (C13H28), Tetradecane (C14H30), Pentadecanol (C15H32O), Hexadecanol (C16H34O), Hexadecane (C16H34),
Naphthalene (C10H8), Octadecane (C18H38), Octadecanol (C18H38O), Docosane (C22H46), and Tetracosane (C24H50).

Fig. 4. Product yield from pyrolysis experiment.

4. Conclusion

This paper studied municipal plastic waste (MPW) composition study at the transfer station in Bangkok city,
Thailand. The major composition was HDPE, LDPE, PP, and PET accounting for 57.4%, 17.4%, 7.3%, and 5.9% of
total MPW, respectively. OTHER, PS, and PVC represented 5%, 4.8%, and 2.2%, respectively. From the pyrolysis
test of HDPE, LDPE, PP, and mixture of HDPE and LDPE, resulted showed that the calorific value of oil product
was higher than that of the raw plastic materials in all cases. Oil yield from the pyrolysis was range from 40% to
60%. The highest oil yield was the LDPE (60%) while the lowest one was the HDPE (40%). The pyrolysis of LDPE
gave the highest energy recovery rate (75% consider only energy in oil product). The mixture of HDPE and LDPE at
the ratio of 2:1 that suits the practical situation showed 59% energy recovery. Various alkanes and alkenes type of
hydrocarbon were found in the produced pyrolysis oil.

Acknowledgements

This research was funded by the Faculty of Engineering, Kasetsart University.

References

[1] Ngoc UN, Schnitzer H. Sustainable solutions for solid waste management in Southeast Asian countries. Waste Manag 2009;29: 1982-95.
[2] Shekdar AV. Sustainable solid waste management: an integrated approach for Asian countries. Waste Manag 2009;29:1438-48.
[3] Zhang DQ, Tan SK, Gersberg RM. Municipal solid waste management in China: status, problems and challenges. J Environ Manage 2010;
91:1623-33.
[4] Hoornweg D, Bhada-Tata P. What a waste: a global review of solid waste management. 2012.
[5] A Final Report on Survey and Analysis of Municipal Solid Waste Composition of Thailand (in Thai). Pollution Control Department,
Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment, Thailand, 2003.
[6] Fujii Y. Successful source separation in Asian Cities: Lessons from Japans experience and action research in Thailand. 2008.
[7] Miandad R, Barakat MA, Aburiazaiza AS, Rehan M, Nizami AS. Catalytic pyrolysis of plastic waste: A review. Process Saf Environ 2016;
102:822-38.