What Happens Next to Plastic Bags and Film Packaging

After sending your plastic packaging to the recycling center, what becomes of it? According to Toolbase Services most plastic bags are recycled into composite lumber, which is half wood fibers – recovered from sawdust – and half recycled plastics, such as plastic bags and film.

The lumber can be used for a variety of structures, and manufacturers say it is more durable than conventional preservative-treated lumber.

Plastic bag and films can also be recycled back into plastic bags and other products such as floor tiles, plastic cones, cables and trashcans. Helping to drive the increase of plastic bag and film recycling, the plastic industry group – the Progressive Bag Affiliates – announced a goal of 40 percent recycled content in all plastic shopping bags made by member companies by 2015.

If a plastic package cannot be recycled, the EPA recommends energy recovery opportunities before landfilling. Energy recovery is the employment of waste to create energy by burning garbage. Plastics are a great source of fuel for waste-to-energy plants. The 87 plants in the U.S. created about 14 million kilowatt hours of electricity in 2010 using 12 percent of the municipal solid waste stream, including plastics, according to the Energy Information Administration.

The combination of plastics and other wastes promotes the efficient burning of other substances, producing cleaner emissions and less ash. If plastics are unable to be recycled, energy recovery decreases the amount of waste in landfills and generates electricity for homes.

Learn more about energy recovery with these articles: Waste-to-Energy From the Inside and Op-Ed: Using Hard-to-Recycle Plastics For Fuel/