Product marking and product tracking

How can we keep plastic off the oceans? How does plastic waste actually end up in the oceans?

Around 80% of the plastic that ends up in the oceans comes from rivers, which is why many initiatives focus on intercepting plastic waste before it reaches the sea. Other organizations, mostly of a local nature, concentrate on cleaning up beaches, removing the plastic waste that has washed up on them.
In contrast, the collection of plastic in the open sea is technically very challenging. Various initiatives remove plastic from garbage patches, such as the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. However, this proportion is still relatively low compared to the quantities of plastic waste collected from the rivers.

Once the plastic waste has been collected and packed, it is forwarded to the recycling plant in compliance with supply chain controls. The process here is similar to the usual plastic waste processing: pre-sorting, shredding, washing, drying and fine sorting of the flakes before they finally enter the extruder.

A reliable method of identifying whether a recyclate was actually made from plastic waste originating from the sea, river or beach is the so-called marker-based process. In this process, a masterbatch with a luminescent inorganic marker is added with the help of a dosing unit. The dosing quantity can be determined using a suitable sensor system and regulated via a control system. The sensor system is installed in the extruder, immediately after the melt filter, or on the vibrating chute after granulation.  (...)

► Brochure (pdf)

There are already a number of systems for separating and sorting plastic waste according to color and plastic type. In addition, image processing systems, paired with artificial intelligence (AI), provide good services in the recognition of shapes or in the search for applied barcodes or QR codes and so-called digital watermarks when separating plastic packaging. But what happens in the further course of the recycling process after washing and shredding the pre-sorted material? Especially if they are fragments or flakes of the same color and the same type of plastic?
A printed code or digital watermark can then no longer be used, which means that it is no longer possible to differentiate between food and non-food, for example. After regranulation, the recyclate can no longer be used to determine the area in which the source material was used.
In order to be able to check the section in the recycling process immediately before and after the recyclate is extruded, a permanent, processing-resistant and temperature-resistant marking or coding must be applied to the plastic matrix. This makes it possible to close the gap in material monitoring, particularly with regard to identity, origin and quality. The marking typically consists of phosphorescent, inorganic microparticles. Due to their inert properties and size,
they can be incorporated into almost all plastic products. Marker-based masterbatches from Gabriel-Chemie are now available under the brand name TAGTEC (Taggant Technology). (...)

► Press release (pdf)
► Press release (Word/zip)
► Brochure (pdf)

What is the best way to monitor my product throughout its life cycle?
The digital product passport from R-Cycle, DPP for short, provides an excellent basis for this task. The product and recycling-relevant data can be queried in a simple manner using the DPP. The DPP can be opened with two different codes: a QR code or a digital watermark. Both can either be applied to the product as sleeves or labels or lasered into the injection mould as a 3D code.
Digital watermarks are considered copy-proof, whereas a QR code is easy to imitate. Nevertheless, a QR code can be classified as 'safe’ in combination with the TAGTEC masterbatches from Gabriel-Chemie. The TAGTEC masterbatches from Gabriel-Chemie contain a rich selection of different light-stimulable markers that can be detected using special optical sensor technology from Sensor Instruments. TAGTEC-marked products have proven to be forgery-proof, especially when used in combination with the features provided by a DPP, thereby providing very robust and reliable supply chain monitoring.

 
► Press release (pdf)
► Press release (Word/pdf)

Improved Sorting of Plastic Waste with Luminescent Pigments
The HolyGrail 2.0 Initiative aims to improve the sorting of plastic waste. For this purpose, digital watermarks containing information on packaging type, material, and usage will be applied on products. However, the method also has certain drawbacks. Here, luminescent pigments provide an alternative that is permanent and can withstand several processing cycles.