Plastic Waste Management by Substituting Natural Fibres

doi:10.4236/jsemat.2012.24044

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Journal of Surface Engineered Materials and Advanced Technology, 2012, 2, 292-294

http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/jsemat.2012.24044 Published Online October 2012 (http://www.SciRP.org/journal/jsemat)

Plastic Waste Management by Substituting Natural Fibres

Surabhi Srivastava

Department of Civil Engineering, Bahra University, Shimla Hills, Himachal Pradesh, India.

Email: [email protected]

Received December 31st, 2011; revised February 1st, 2012; accepted February 11th, 2012

ABSTRACT

This paper presents substitute for non-biodegradable plastic packed material which comes as a part of municipal solid

waste and becoming global problem due to its overuse. The plastic as packaging material has its advantages but also

have more disadvantages because of its durability that it does not degraded. If the packaging material is made up of

natural fibres it has more effect on local ecosystem. This paper provides the solution that use of natural fibres as pack-

aging due to its light weight, high strength to weight ratio, corrosion resistance and other advantages are useful for the

industry as well as commercially availability for the markets.

Keywords: Solid Waste; Biodegradable; Non-Biodegradable; Plastic; Natural Fibres

1. Introduction

In developing countries of the world, plastic waste has

become a current challenge for the environmental engi-

neers to solve. For an example developing country like

India, statistics show that the exponential growth rate of

India with 1,210,000,000 (1.21 billion) people is the

second most populous country in the world, while China

is on the top with over 1,350,044,605 (1.35 billion) peo-

ple. The figures show that India represents almost

17.31% of the world's population, which means one out

of six people on this planet live in India. Although, the

crown of the world's most populous country is on China’s

head for decades, India is all set to take the numerous

positions by 2030. With the population growth rate at

1.58%, India is predicted to have more than 1.53 billion

people by the end of 2030. Being second most populous

country in the wor ld, India continuously k eeps on adding

waste material within its geographical boundaries. India

has about 16% of the world population and 2.5% of

world’s land area. In an already densely populated coun-

try with even more densely packed urban centers, land

for proper waste treatment, disposal and overall man-

agement is scarce. Recent and sustained economic

growth increasing living standards of the people, in-

creased manufacturing and production activities has led

to increased to rapid rise in the waste generation rated [1].

India produces around 42 Million tons of solid waste

annually. There is wide difference in the waste genera-

tion rates in rural and urban areas. Even within the urban

areas, the composition includes more paper and inert

material and less of organic and compostable material as

the city population and size increases. The per capita ge n-

eration rate increases and the overall calorific value of

the waste drops with increase in the size of the city

(Study by NEE RI).

Now with the above data we can calculate the per day

generation of solid waste of India & also we can calcu-

late the expected cost for its management which can be

done by the processes minimization, recycling & dis-

posal of the solid waste generated. These processes have

been adopted by the most developed countries as the

menu for developing solid waste management strategies

[2,3]. Depending upon a number of factors such as to-

pography climate [4], population density (village to metro

city), transportation infrastructure, socioeconomic and

environmental laws of India it is important to make proper

pre action plan to manage solid waste.

2. Composition of Municipal Solid Waste in

India

The biodegradable portion dominates the bulk of Mu-

nicipal Solid Waste. Generally the biod egradable portion

is mainly due to food and yard waste. With rising ur-

banization and change in lifestyle and food habits, the

amount of municipal solid waste has been increasing

rapidly and its composition changing. Figure 1 repre-

sents Pie chart for the various category of waste gener-

ated. There are different categories of waste generated,

each take their own time to degenerate (as illustrated in

the Table 1 [5]).

3. Method of Data Collection

There is a manual method of data collection [6,7], which

will be important whi le designing a t ool or waste treatment

Plastic Waste Management by Substituting Natural Fibres 293

Table 1. The type of litter we generated & the approximate time it takes to degenerate.

Type of Litter Approximate time to degenerate the litter

Vegetable, fruitpeel, leaves, foodstuffs A week or two

Paper 10 - 30 days

Cotton cloth 2 - 5 months

Wood 10 - 15 years

Woolen items 1 year

Tin, aluminium and other metal items such as cans 100 - 500 years

Glass bottles Undetermined

Source: NSWAI-National Solid Waste Association of India.

Table 2. Per capita waste generation in India cities.

Population range (million) Average per capita waste generation (gm/capita/day)

0.1 - 0.5 210

0.5 - 1.0 250

1 - 2 230

5 and above 500

Source: National Environm ental Engineering Research Institute, India, 1995.

Figure 1. Pie chart presentation of various category of waste

generated.

plant in future period. The future period for which a pro-

vision is made in the waste management scheme is

known as the design period for the waste management

system. It is necessary to estimate this future population

as accurately as possible. Depending upon the possibili-

ties of the future development of the country & its in-

creasing population will definitely emit the plastic waste

on large scale. Then the plastic waste management tools

will be designed on the possible future population of the

region, .The population growth rate at 1.58%, India is

predicted to have more than 1.53 billion people by the

end of 2030 by the Geometric Increase Method of popu-

lation forecasting. According to CPCB waste generated

by per person per day 490 gms. It is estimated that upto

2030 the waste generated by per person per day will be

750 gms. Simply by multiplying we can calculate the

waste generated by more than 1.53 billion people by the

end of 2030.

Other sources of information include personal obser-

vation, news reports, books &journals. Field surveys

were carried out in some areas & the active official

dumpsites on the various samples of waste generated

were collected.

4. Result and Discussions

Table 2 gives data on per capita waste generation in In-

dian cities out of which the 50% of waste is plastic waste.

Technically, we use plastics for packaging material, may

be defined as a material that contains a polymerized or-

ganic substance of large molecular weight. We can use

Natural fiber as packaging material instead of plastic due

to its properties like—light weight, high strength to

weight ratio, low cost & availability [8]. However, natu-

ral fiber based packaging materials are environment

friendly to a large exten t.

5. Conclusion

The investment for an on-site waste management system

in an individual health care setting is very high. In con-

trast, an integrated common treatment & disposal facility

Plastic Waste Management by Substituting Natural Fibres

294

cost a maximum of Rs. 3 to 15/kg/day with an added

benefit of no capital investment being required. The

company could have profit about 35% making it a sus-

tainable venture if they use natural fibres as packaging

material instead of plastic [4]. The natural fibres are en-

vironmentally sound it will also give good market cost to

the farmers

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