SBIR Phase I: Develop a Cost-Effective Route to Recycle Post-Consumer Plastic Exterior Automotive parts

This Small Business Innovation Research Phase I project will define technologies to successfully recover painted plastic automobile parts from end-of-life vehicles. 400 million pounds of plastic is consumed annually to produce automotive exterior parts. These parts are typically large and readily identifiable and could be recovered from automobile salvage yards yet they continue to be disposed of in landfills. This project will evaluate the quality of plastic from parts recovered from automobile salvage operations from various regions of the country and develop a process to remove paint and economically recycle the plastic back into many of the original automotive applications. The automotive industry uses approximately 425 million pounds of thermoplastic polyolefins annually on vehicles produced in North America. Success of this work will allow the U.S. automobile industry to enhance its competitiveness when faced with mandates for minimum recycle-content materials.