Development of an Evaluation Tool for Engineering Sustainable Recycling Pathways

Abstract

As the product end of life is becoming more and more complex, the recycling systems encountered many difficulties in valuing all the materials contained in the products. This involves not only recovering many materials but also getting the most economical way and the minimal environmental impact. The recycling industry is a new business sector that needs to be accompanied in its development and research of the most sustainable pathway to guarantee the resources circularity. That is why recyclers need robust assessment tools to make the right choices during the engineering of recycling pathways. This assessment, during the designing phase of the waste management line, should enable recyclers to choose the right recycling processes for a wide range of end of life products. In this article, we present how we develop a methodology for evaluating the performance of recycling processes and give relevant indicators during their design phase.