Mechanical properties improvement of recycled polypropylene with material value conservation schemes using virgin plastic blends

Plastic packaging that applied material value conservation paradigm will generate good quality plastic waste. It can be recycled to produce raw material for new packaging. However, repetitive recycling has impacts on lowering its mechanical properties. Recycled plastic is expected not to undergo mechanical properties degradation. This research proposed to blend recycled plastic pellets with its virgin plastic to reduce mechanical properties degradation. Mechanical properties of recycled polypropylene are compared to 100% virgin polypropylene and recycled/virgin polypropylene blends with composition 90/10, 70/30, 50/50, 30/70, and 10/90. Mechanical properties tested in this research are modulus of elasticity, tensile strength, elongation at break, and density. All were tested according to ASTM for mechanical properties testing materials. This study revealed blending 50% virgin polypropylene significantly improves mechanical properties of recycled plastics and keep improving at 70% virgin polypropylene. The optimum improvement based on four mechanical properties was found at composition 30/70 of recycled/virgin plastic. Elongation at break is the most critical property where degradation was found at 90/10. Blending 6^th recycled and virgin polypropylene gives opportunities to improve the mechanical properties of recycled plastic products with careful consideration of the compositions. By implementing material value conservation, good quality plastic waste can be recycled repetitively. This will decrease accumulation of plastic waste generation and usage of non-renewable plastic’s raw material. The positive impact is not only to economic of plastic industry but also to the quality of environment.