American International University Bangladesh, Bangladesh

Development of outdoor plastic pavement tiles from plastics waste

The conservation of energy and sustaining clean environment had been a focus for attention. Waste plastics release hazardous substances into the environment. Plastic shredding machine had played a considerable role in the waste plastic recycling process towards solving the problem associated with plastic waste and the harvesting of the energy that the waste plastic could provide for human needs.

Plastic waste is becoming the scourge of the earth. Containers, bags, soda bottles, and all types of plastics either are burned, end up in landfills or in our oceans. The aim of the project is to utilize the plastic waste in a smart way to create something useful such as pavements or roof tiles. Waste plastic will contribute to the making of tiles under high temperature and pressure to ensure durability and greater life span of usage. Different forms of Polyvinylchlorides mixed with silica is used to make plastic pavements instead of cement which will prove to be more economical and will also help to reduce plastic waste from the environment. Performance evaluation of the machine indicates that the machine efficiency is between 90-96 % for the HDPE, PVC and the PET.

Top 3 Learnings

1. We focussed to eradicate the current waste plastic pollution in Dhaka.
2. We thought of making a small-scale project so everyone can own it.
3. We wanted to reduce the dependency ratio on the economy.