Evaluation of Plastic Waste Management in Thailand Using Material ...

The amounts of plastic waste disposed at landfills will increase in 2016 due to the increase
of biodegradable plastic consumption. The recycling business of bio-plastics is not
profitable because low plastics are contained in bio-products, and they are not used to
recover energy in the incineration due to GHG emissions from incinerators. The available
way to used bio-plastic wastes is the composting in order to produce chemical fertilizers
for the agriculture works (Treewijitkasam, 2013).
Increasing of recycling rate will make the amount of improper disposed wastes decrease in
2016. Approximately 3% of improper disposed wastes in MSW will be expanded and
stocked in the environment. The total stock in the environment will be 0.34 million tonnes,
while the total stock of the scenario 2B will be 4.39 million tonnes in 2016 as same as the
scenario 2A.
The highest amount of stocked plastics was shown in the plastic consumption process
amounted to 1.8 million tonnes. This stock is from the long-live products and
reused/secondary plastic products. This amount of stocked plastics will be highest in the
next five or ten years if the waste reduction and reuse policy stimulates people to use longlived
products for over five or ten years.
In conclusion, the total input, stock and output of scenario 2A and scenario 2B were
presented in the similar amounts. Scenario 2A will stimulate people to reduce and reuse
plastic wastes by 10% with in 2016. The amount of MPW for landfilling of scenario 2A in
2016 will decrease from 37% in 2010 to 30% in 2016. Otherwise, the percentage of MPW
for landfilling of scenario 2B will be equal to 40% in 2016. Finally, approximately 8% and
3% of MPW of scenario 2A and 2B will be disposed in open environment.
4.3.1.3 Scenario 3: Increase in waste to energy options
In the scenario 3, the changes and impacts of as alternative energy development plan in
2012-2021 was were predicted. The goals of this plan include the energy recovery rate and
alternative fuel used will increase by recovery 160 MW of energy within 2021. This plan
promotes to use wastes as fuels in order to recovery energy such as biogas from anaerobic
digestion, municipal incineration, and alternative fuel production (coal, crude oil, RDF,
and carbon black) (DEDE, 2013). The amounts of plastic production and plastic waste
generation in 2016 were same as the scenario 1. The calculation of each flow in the
scenario 3 is shown in Table E-9 in Appendix E. Figure 4.31 shows the material flow of
plastics in Thailand in 2016; the scenario 3.
This scenario assumed that 10% of municipal plastic wastes in 2016 will not collected to
dispose as well as the scenario 2, but whole industrial plastic wastes will be collected and
disposed properly. The concept of this scenario includes the increases of municipal and
industrial incineration and oil recovery. 10% of municipal plastic wastes will be burnt at
both of municipal and industrial incinerators.
The amount of municipal plastic wastes for incineration will be 0.24 million tonnes in 2016
out of which 2,371 tonnes is thermosetting wastes. Almost industrial plastic wastes
(87.6%) will be combusted at the industrial incinerators, and 0.3 million tonnes of RDF
production from landfill sites will be burnt in the cement kiln.
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