2023 Challenges

Electrão is focused on helping to increase glass collection, counteracting the national downward trend, so that the country can meet its demanding recycling targets.  

In 2023 it developed the "Green Flags" project, inspired by a successful experience in Spain. The initiative involved the municipalities of Almada, Aljezur and Vila do Bispo, the Municipal Waste Management Systems, AIVE (Association of Packaging Glass Manufacturers) and focused on the HORECA channel, which includes hotels and restaurants, but also coffee shops and catering services, where the glass separation rate is still low. In addition to the evaluation of the selective collection operation, awareness-raising actions were carried out to increase adherence to door-to-door collection. As a result of this initiative, door-to-door glass collection in Almada, provided by Amarsul, was extended to 54 new establishments. 

Also in 2023, Electrão promoted a study to assess the potential for glass recovery in the Mechanical and Biological Treatment infrastructures of three Municipal Waste Management Systems: Resinorte, Amarsul and Tratolixo.  A significant percentage of glass packaging is sent for undifferentiated collection, which means we need to work more closely with these systems. 

In urban cleaning operations, namely manual sweeping and the maintenance of litter bins, there is also a high potential for glass recovery. In 2023 Electrão developed a pilot project in this area in collaboration with two parishes in the municipality of Lisbon: Santo António and Parque das Nações. Of the packaging materials recovered and sorted in the two parishes, glass stood out with a recovery rate of over 30% in the bins and 20% as a result of manual sweeping. 

The management of hazardous plastics, which result from recycling processes, continues to be a concern for Electrão, which in 2023 sorted and processed 886.2 tons of used electrical equipment separately. The critical parts of this equipment, such as capacitors, batteries, printed circuit boards and copper cables, were sorted and processed separately. At the same time, Electrão also carried out two batch tests to evaluate the waste sent to the Palmela Recycling Center. 

In this way, Electrão continues to promote, in an innovative way, the separation, during the recycling process, of plastics with dangerous substances present in used electrical equipment, namely plastics containing flame retardants, which are persistent organic pollutants (POPs). 

These plastics are considered hazardous because they contain flame retardants, which are mixtures of chemicals added to a wide range of products in order to make them less flammable. This includes some plastics used in electrical equipment, especially small domestic appliances, computer, communication and technology equipment. Flame retardants are chemical pollutants that are persistent, bioaccumulative and toxic to humans and the environment. 

Currently, as a result of European guidelines, the manufacture of new electrical equipment already takes into account the restriction of dangerous chemical substances. The new generation of equipment takes these planned limits into account, with less impact, safeguarding the same heat and fire resistance characteristics, which has been possible thanks to the research and technical development promoted by various manufacturers.  

Electrão is developing a pilot project to recover used electrical equipment from scrap metal in collaboration with waste management operators and Municipal Waste Management Systems. One of the main difficulties in managing this equipment is that it is mixed with metallic waste, which prevents it from being treated in an environmentally correct way in dedicated units and ends up going to shredding units. 

The aim of this project is to assess the possibility of segregating electrical equipment and its components, such as batteries, from these mixtures of ferrous waste on an industrial scale, and to specifically sort critical fractions, such as capacitors and printed circuit boards. 

This project also includes the possibility of fragmenting this equipment/components into individual batches and assessing the sorting and decontamination capacity during the fragmentation process, particularly of critical fractions such as hazardous plastics, which presupposes the definition of minimum infrastructure requirements and technical procedures for all operations. 

The idea is that the pilot project could cover all the fragmentation units interested in taking part under the supervision of an independent entity, whose team will include a WLX/CENELEC auditor.