The “greenest” way to recycle the valuable plastic in TV sets is to mechanically recover it.
Two methods can be used to recycle the 2.5 kilograms of plastic in an average 64-centimetre cathode ray tube TV. It can either be incinerated to generate energy, or the salvageable plastic can be mechanically recovered and reused. Until now, which of these methods was the greenest was unclear, as incineration produces emissions, while mechanical recovery consumes energy.
Now, after an analysis of each method, mechanical recovery has won out. “Incineration emits the larger quantity of greenhouse gases,” says Gjergj Dodbiba of Tokyo University,…
