The Plastics Recycling Association of Singapore - PRAS - is wasting no time in getting down to work. At the official inauguration on 17 August, plans were outlined for various approaches designed to ‘enhance Singapore's capability in plastics recycling’ by Minister for Sustainability and the Environment, Grace Fu. She outlined three areas of opportunities to be targeted by the newly launched association.
In the first place, PRAS will develop and expand Singapore's capabilities for plastic waste collection, among others, by establishing a beverage container return scheme for packaging waste.
The scheme will hold producers, such as beverage companies, accountable for the collection and recycling of their beverage bottles. Consumers will get a refund when they return empty beverage containers at designated return points, said the Minister.
A PET bottle recycling facility in Singapore would be one way for PRAS to strengthen Singapore's local capability for recycling PET bottles, in addition to creating economic value and green jobs locally. In addition, it will bring expertise in areas like precision engineering, manufacturing of recycling equipment, and plastic recycling processes, she said.
Secondly, PRAS can collaborate with Singapore's ‘research and development ecosystem to explore new solutions in plastic waste recycling, said Ms Fu.
A team from A*STAR's Institute of Chemical and Engineering Sciences is already developing a solution to recover PE and PET layers in multi-layered films, while a team from Temasek Polytechnic's Centre for Urban Sustainability is looking at whether mixed plastic waste can be processed into ingredients for building and construction applications, she noted.
Lastly, PRAS can create opportunities to bring about a "circular economy" beyond Singapore."Singapore is certainly not alone in recognising the need for a circular approach when using our resources," she emphasised, citing Malaysia's roadmap towards zero single-use plastics, and Indonesia's circular economy approach towards sustainable growth and development. Through bodies like PRAS, there are opportunities for Singapore to ‘accelerate the shift towards plastics circularity in our region’, she said.
"While plastic is a critical component in our manufacturing and logistical processes, its impact on the environment cannot be ignored. The current business-as-usual mode cannot continue. The world is urgently in need of sustainable solutions to plastic waste," said Ms Fu.
According to Edwin Khew, PRAS’ first president, the association’s targets are to grow from the current 4 per cent of plastics recycled in Singapore to 30 per cent and then to 70 per cent within the next five to 10 years.
This, he said, ‘we hope to achieve with recycling technologies and new plastic technologies that we will be introducing into Singapore by Memorandums of Understanding (MOUs) we will be signing’.
In a separate announcement, PRAS said it has established the Plastics Recycling Centre of Excellence to fast track and customise leading-edge solutions to Singapore’s ubiquitous plastic waste problem, which could then serve as a reference to facilitate ASEAN countries' own recycling projects.
The centre will sign five MOUs with different partners focusing on a range of skills training, and research and development collaborations to achieve a higher circularity of plastics.
Singapore also plans to construct a new, integrated waste management facility - the first infrastructure project by a statutory board to be financed through green bonds, said Minister Fu.
The Tuas Nexus facility will be Singapore's first integrated facility to treat incinerable waste, source-segregated food waste, and dewatered sludge.
"In Singapore, our amount of waste generated locally has increased sevenfold over the last 40 years. Our only landfill, the Semakau Landfill, will run out of space by 2035, based on the current waste disposal rate, even with incineration," she said.
The island nation generated 868,000 tonnes of plastic waste in 2020, of which only 4 per cent was recycled.
”It is clear we need a paradigm shift - to move from a linear approach of take, make and throw, to a circular one where waste becomes a resource and is reused over and over again. And we need to move fast.”