Material Flow Analysis (MFA) Study for Sustainable Management of PVC Wastes in Thailand (Phase III)

Abstract

Polyvinyl chloride (PVC) products are used for domestic consumption more than 400,000 tons annually and tend to be increasing in Thailand. After discarded, these products will become wastes which are being accumulated and could cause several environmental problems if they are disposed by inappropriate method. In previous studies, our group investigated the material flow of PVC in Thailand to handle the PVC waste problems. Material Flow Analysis (MFA) model was developed to estimate the quantity and route of PVC wastes in Thailand. Furthermore, the primary data were collected from recycle shops and landfill sites were used to estimate the amount of PVC wastes that are generated and recycled on yearly basis. Phase III study was carried out in order to further proceed the MFA model by using annual domestic production data from 1971 to 2016 as an input in the model along with an average service lifetime of each product, consumer behaviour and economic decisions and off-spec products for accuracy estimation. Moreover, sheet & film product were included in this investigation in order to expand range of PVC products, in which covers about 93% of total PVC products in Thailand. In addition, the existing primary data were revised along with the new data were from other recycle shops and converters to estimate the amount recycled PVC products in 2015 and 2016 together with recycling ratio of each PVC product in Thailand. Finally, potential improvements of PVC waste management and suitable data collection system are proposed in order to promote environmentally friendly schemes for PVC production and utilization.