Awesome video! I just graduated in chemical engineering and I was shocked at the lack of sustainable practices that we learned in school. You bring a great point that educating industry experts as well as demonstrating the new materials' long-term viability is of paramount importance.
I love your easily digestable delivery which is great for average people who arn't in the least bit qualified in any field of eco tech but still have to live on the same planet with people who are . There is a great need for radical change and the quicker the better !
I've been seeing variations on these plastic building bricks for at least 10 years now, they really seem to have limited uses. Bricks made of several different kinds of plastic in particular seem to border on outright useless for anything other than relatively temporary structures. The wildly different material properties of the potentially *dozens* of different kinds of plastics mean they don't typically have uniform structural properties between bricks unless extra steps are taken beyond simply shredding, at which point the processing cost of each brick tends to go up substantially. Many types of plastic degrade substantially when exposed to direct sunlight for long periods of time, so roughly amalgamated plastic bricks will *always* have to be coated with something for UV protection. This isn't necessarily a deal-breaker, but footage/images of these bricks being used raw as construction materials is misleading at best. Additionally some plastics start to experience substantial changes when exposed to temperatures as low as 50-90C, the former can be reached in direct sun here in Australia on a fairly regular basis, the latter is an extremely low temperature for a structural brick to start undergoing softening. PVC for example starts to soften right around 90C, while many biodegradable plastics start degrading at around 50-60C under the right conditions. If you're not bothering to sort your plastic before shredding and compressing it into bricks, how on earth are you going to prevent accidentally generating a brick that's made largely of a plastic unsuited for *some* application? If your bricks have wildly different material properties then the only use cases are going to be few and far between. If the plastics ARE being sorted, then that's a lot of time, effort, and expense, at which point you could do conventional recycling (Which already has a wide variety of issues). Nevermind potential issues with fire. I'd personally happily make a garden shed out of these sorts of bricks, maybe even something more substantial if I could be assured of the composition and the associated maintenance required... But I just can't see these being used on an industrial scale. And do we really want to educe a demand for what amounts to a single re-use of miscellaneous plastic? What other possible use could these be put to if they were damaged? You've essentially got a brick of mystery plastic (sounds like a nightmare) which is unusable for literally everything except possibly being turned into more questionably useful bricks. While storing plastic waste in big compressed bricks is likely better than it floating around in our oceans, I'd still much prefer a solution focused on preventing it from ever getting there in the first place.
With the use of Rino liner as a paint on both sides of the brick sun and air are stopped from the degradation of the mixed tapes of plastic, and then we will have to suffer from the off gassing of the paint, so we can not win either way.
@xxxx945 microplastics take decades to decay, but prior to that, they have been found in the placenta and milk of new mothers. Plastics in humans is a pretty big impact in my opinion.
The bulk shredding of plastics makes me wonder about the inevitable breakdown/leaching. As a material facing UV, heat, and cold, what will it breathe out over time? Precious Plastic on the other hand seems to have education understanding the material and the desired application. It's all wonderful resourcefulness, I just don't want to find out 15 years later I'm living in a poisonous box
As opposed to chipboard and the formaldehyde it contains and the hundreds of other semi toxic components of the average house. Microplastics that are consumed by way of foods and water, it makes sense for encapsulation till we know definitely what to do with the original sin.
Microplastics are now found even in fetus . Microplastics inside my HOME .. nope ! The more plastic heats the more Pthalates it leaches . So anything is great for building homes except Plastics.
@@DeeP_BosE Sorry but your new home is already loaded with curing agents of all sorts. Like anything toxic, better to encapsulate and know what is there than simply wish it was not in a newly finished product.
Captain Charles Moore, the discoverer of the Pacific Garbage Patch, stated that plastic would not have become a problem IF…we’d only have used it for things that we want to last forever (500-1,000 years or so).
Dave, I always enjoy our videos, but today's opening with the self depreciating was absolutely enjoyable. We don't often het to see your humor and its a welcome addition, lol. Take care and keep bringing us great informative content.
There's a product that's been on the market for a while called Lok N Blok which only upcycles polypropylene into its product. But it doesn't need supports because all of the blocks interlink. There are also gaps to fish through the wiring. This makes it twice as fast to build with and doesn't require expertise to do so. But getting approval in the states has been a challenge. These are mostly used in SA.
@@trueriver1950 lol actually I heard it was more that the patent clerks couldn't understand the concept. They thought it was too much like a cinder block or something.
Delighted to hear someone from outside my circles cite Kate Raworth's work! Very important for us to move forward conceptually, as well as technologically. Thank you!
Levi's other channel - @FutureProofTV - than the lifestyle one in Dave's list - has several vids on companies that are B Corp certified - and some on B Corp themselves. Wrth dipping to get a quick background
This is not exactly recycling and not really repurposing; its better. More like urban mining or maybe we should call it re-mining? It creates value for disposable plastics and removes much of the burden of placing the waste back into a resource stream. It seems that is just needs to be clean not pure like so many process require. Brillient!
Hi I love your delivery of information, it's funny 30 years ago I work in a small business that recycle plastic and made black ⚫️ plastic fence posts and cattle grids and clear or white was used to make the roadside match sticks 😄 😀 , there was an industrial shredder, making chips /flakes that were injection moulded, plastic milk bottles crates were great cracks 😀
Dave, I love your dry witness and your around about way of telling us that what you are about to say is well worth listening to. I love your presentation style. You are the man.
plastic is flammable... so what? have a look at 3:37 the gas torch is obviously not causing any damage to the building block... that thick, noxious smokeyou are talking of may be more true for a waste incineration dump...
@@7sonderling That’s why the clip is so short - they cut off before the material reaches a self-sustaining point (lit). Tires are also difficult to start burning, but once lit, they burn quite well, are difficult to extinguish) and release a soup of toxic compounds. As far as flammability ratings for plastic materials, the lowest is HB (horizontal burn), which means once lit, it will continue burning across a horizontally oriented piece. The highest is V0, which means after it is lit, it extinguishes in less than a minute for the thickness tested. Similarly, Vx means the tested thickness extinguishes within x minutes after being lit. Unfortunately, the self-extinguishing behavior is achieved with additives that are often toxic themselves and release a variety of toxic chemicals when defeated. I don’t see this a useful application for plastic materials as there would be no one willing to insure such structures.
@@7sonderling 3:30 that block was coated with something and when it burns off you will have a nicely melting and then burning block of mixed plastics. Good luck surviving that building fire!
@@chow-chihuang4903 this is probably due to a lack of imagination. i see plenty of possible applications, and the manufacturer certainly does too, they certainly know all the fire protection regulations and will still have good reasons to see a market here, they are not stupid and don't have any money to give away...
Lateral thinking doesn't question the reason for plastics in the first place. The answer is to say no to all plastics, not to build a new "recycling" industry.
Good luck the next time you need medical attention…there are niche uses for plastics that, will need other products developed and there are currently no good alternatives for some uses…I personally don’t want a glass tube stuck up my arm or inserted anywhere. Do you suggest we revert to rubber tubing and glass containers?
@@GeckoHikerI don't think there ARE better alternatives to all plastics. There are alternatives to many plastics that have their own downsides, like poor performance, high cost, and more greenhouse gas production. We should strive to eliminate cheap single use crap, and clamp down on the small number of countries that are responsible for the majority of ocean plastics.
@@GeckoHiker "I survived X just fine" - ooh, I know this one! This is the survivorship bias fallacy! It was alright for you, therefore it's alright for everyone with pacemakers, or premature babies in incubators, or needing to keep any sort of precision surgical instrument or implant sterile, to do without. I don't advocate for a zero-plastic world because there are some things we just can't match or better *yet* with other materials. To do away with them entirely, today, would be asking the world to accept reversing several decades of health and technology advances. I believe the climate crisis can be addressed by targeting the largest, and most divestible, fossil fuel demands without throwing the premature baby out with the bathwater.
I have seen various processes that recycle waste plastic. They either need to be really well sorted or they melt it (producing loads of fumes) into black goop. Hats of to the team to get the everything in and a product out work. Great vid!
Still better to put waste to use, than letting waste be waste. It doesn't mean we stop trying to reduce plastic use, but it means some of the used plastic gets a renewed purpose other than being lost to the environment.
@@eyemastervideo Better but still bad. Keep in mind that the reused plastics are already decaying. Without any form of rejuvinating it is nearly as bad as just dumping it. Would recommend to lookup the comment of @Zrummy, It's touching on many aspects of reusing/recycling.
@@eyemastervideo Is it better in this instance though? We've already got materials that can be used in buildings (natural and unnatural). It strikes me that by not separating out the materials, they are using things that could be better recycled and used elsewhere. Thus we are creating more new raw material to replace that which is not being recycled because of this process.
@@ricos1497 it's not happening now; about 7% to 12% of plastic actually gets recycled in the USA, and the rest ends up in landfills. It's THERE, it exists, so putting it into another place makes zero difference. What putting it into a useful place does is avoid the use of whatever material is NOT being produced because plastic waste has instead occupied that niche. If you look at how cinderblock is used in most buildings, it's entirely encased in other materials, such as insulation, sheet rock, OSB, etc. If that cinderblock was made of plastic bricks, and the tensile and / or compression stress functions required of the total wall structure is met, then the end result is: Less concrete production for making cinderblock Same quantity of plastic garbage exists as before Plastic not released into erosional environment until building is destroyed
It would be good to obtain more specific information on the plastics material. Important would be results of structural engineering tests, heat and flammability tests, specific utilization criteria among other things. On the surface utilization and redirection of waste plastics at an industrial rate is a win win. First we need to find out about the life, safety and environmental cycle. Would like to see more of this.
@@svenjorgensenn8418 That is an "assumption" which means you don't know. Danger of microplactics is still a possibility, but we dont know what change chemically and structurally o cures when it is heated and compressed. There is a lot we do not know, yet we also do not known for sure if such material will stop the building industry from clear cutting the planet. The possibilities are immense. The down side is as yet not made public.
Reminds me of a company/initiative or something from 20 years ago dealing with automobile tires and what to do with mountains of them piling up in a well-used and no longer useable state creating periodic havoc from mosquitos when it rained and fires when it didn't. Turned out the Germans had a machine that separated out the steel belts and then pulverized the rubber into powder from which all manner of useful items could be made. A friend of mine tried to interest the California governor of the time into subsidizing since California is a much-travelled state with an impossible amount of old tires ending up here clogging up the place. I was relocating to Amsterdam at the time, my friend subsequently died, and I never found out what the heck became of the idea. Details are probably stuck in a long-dead hard drive.
The production of cement is a tough one to cut down on CO2 emissions due to the high temps needed to make it. I was interviewed by a company recently that is trying to capture the emissions from cement production and use it to 'grow' a cement-like product that can be used in place of cement, much how like a coral reef grows. Concrete sure is a pretty amazing product for certain applications and one of the oldest still used today.
@@id10t98co2 isn't the problem. Actually our planet is more green than ever because of the co2 and nitrogen in the air. The problem are the toxic waste products that erode into our water and soil. The plastics and heavy metals are more of a problem than co2. Our stupid planet won't learn that all these heavy metal machines live EVs and co2 capture devices actually are worse for the environment than simple co2.
We should be concentrating IMHO, in producing and exporting solar from African & Middle Eastern countries; along with more household yield gains, via new build geothermal recycling from existing and traditional heat and power sources of energy, as well as, retrofitting subsidised heat pumps to prewar properties.
@@christopherwilkinson326 The USA has a lot of utility companies that dont like your ideas unless they get to be the ones to tap the resources to sell the power. Crony capitalism will ruin it.
Since concrete foundations are normally poured to adhere to surrounding rock or soil. I can't see this method as being viable unless you could heat plastic to a pourable consistency.
Regardless of the potential fire and chemical hazards posed by mixed plastic blocks, the fact that plastics are called such because they yield under load makes their use for any load bearing structures a short-sighted idea, especially thermoplastics exposed to both loads and high temperatures. Doesn’t even need to reach their melting point, but a fraction of it, and they yield easily. For non-load bearing components and when fire and fumes aren’t concerns, it can be considered.
everything "yields" under load, those blocks didn't give any part up when a truck went onto one. that's plenty good enough for load bearing structures (not massive ones clearly) but a house or apartment complex would be plenty. once they are all seated and bonded together there isn't going to be moment, they are solid compressed plastic. it's not going to burn unless a massive fire breaks out in the building and at that point your material matters very little. not that those blocks would even burn because they are compressed, the worst that would happen is the outside ( inner wall facing) would melt a bit and that's it. you would still have insulation to stop the spread of fire anyway. no load could make that plastic burn due to compression in a structure because the compression done on the plastic, to form it, is already going to be many times whatever the structure is capable of putting onto those blocks.
This is exactly what I was thinking too, including the emission of harmful gases both under UV or even concealed. There's also the fact that the plastic problem is not solved, but pushed to future generations to solve. The construction sector need to use more wood into larger buildings, this is a very great construction technology developed more recently.
@@rocksfire4390 Actually, yield was quite visible when the truck tire ran over it. It’s called plastic because it yields more easily under the same conditions than other materials. And thermoplastics because they yield extremely easy when heated. I’ve worked with similarly formed blocks and extrusions in attempts to find uses for used film packaging and similar scrap from single-use packaging. Cut a section any way you want, you’ll find a lot of voids, especially if they’re from multi-layer, multi-material film. Plastic yields a lot more than wood, masonry or metal for the same cross section. It has an advantage over wood in that it changes less with moisture content. As far as fire, check what happened with the plastic tiles used to cover the outside of the Grenfell Tower apartments in the UK. That’s why the manufacturer advises to use their metal version for anything more than a few stories high. You’ll also notice they move the flame from the torch very rapidly across the middle of a face, and not repeatedly over the same area either. That’s what you’d do to not ignite a block of plastic. Even then, you see some edges of film in the block light up briefly. Had they kept the flame in one spot for several seconds, especially at an edge or vertex, the material would ignite much more readily. Edit: corrected name of Grenfell Tower.
@@forgotten_world I agree, this is mostly downcycling and kicking the can down the road. Like the crumbled tire rubber used on synthetic turf, which is now acknowledged as releasing carcinogenic and irritating chemicals. If it’s to be used, it should somehow be sealed and not used in structural members. Edit: spelling correction
what about using it as material for foundations. would deform under weight i guess but maybe you could figure the amount of deformation to expect and plan around that. being buried the temperature wouldn't vary too much and fire wouldn't be a likely issue
Great video, thanks Dave. On this subject, the Italian Daliform Group company since years makes construction products from recycled plastics, for example their Iglù modular system for ventilated under floor cavities.
Another great video Dave! In Lombok, Indonesia Eco-Blocks are a local company which use recycled plastic to manufacture blocks to help rebuild schools damaged or destroyed in the 2018 earthquake. It's a great initiative.
Dave, these programs which you produce each Week, are fabulous, And full of so much new information, that they have the effect of buoying my spirts, as I realize how many people are spending money, time, and research, and one huge amount of time intelligently brainstorming, to conceive the projects, in the beginning.👍🌹🌈❤️🙏🏻 Thank yo SO much, for all the hours of work you do each week, in the creation of these super informative videos. Much respect! Me hat is off to you!😁☮️🙏🏻
As a life-long builder, I have often thought of plastics being used exactly like this. The application seems to be particularly simple for low-rise, residential consturction. I see the boo birds have already filled the comments sections with questions about the structural viability of these things and then the off-gassing and degredation of plastics in the human environment, but that already exists with most building products--particle board in particular. Also, building insulation is often insideous and pastic based in its own right. I am not an engineer, but my hunch is that the things would be more than suitable for residential consturction given that the interior walls would be covered with sheetrock (currently all sheetrock is underlain with plastic vapor barriers at the exterior walls) and then stucco walls on the outside. Just so the boo birds no, Dryvit is also a plastic product and most stucco buildings use this latex based stucco instead of actual stucco. I have gone on too long, but I will add, that these things might really be great for humid climates. It would be interesting to know the R value of the things and a few other bits about their resistance to flooding and pests like termites. Thanks for the work you do, Dave.
thank you for the video. sounds like a good idea. I know plastics can have issues with offgassing, when they begin to decay. Is that something that has been investigated in this process?
For all of us doughnuts living in the northern latitude's, get off our butts, melt your own fresh snowfall snow in the winter. Pass through coffee filter, keep in dark cool place, wala, endless supply of great tasting water without dragging home cases of 1 litre bottles of water from the store, only to end up in landfill, oceans, rivers. You get the drift.
Honestly, architects and people at the design/management end of construction are often great advocates for new/sustainable building technologies. Where the construction industry encounters a lot more resistance is further down. There's back pressure from the trades and contractors specifically against trying new products or different construction practices, and not without good reason. Established practices often means low risk fiscal viability. I'm currently engaged in a research project about investigating and proposing some changes in how we frame houses, to allow for disassembly rather than demolition. A large component of which has been in discussing these ideas with both framing and demolition companies, which seem to be interested in these ideas theoretically.
I’m struggling to understand how these plastic blocks can work ok during a fire. if it’s just recycled plastic reformed via pressure and steam won’t they produce toxic smoke?
I was extremely pleased to see you introduce Doughnut Economics. We have one Parish Council in Milton Keynes already on board with DE and I am currently encouraging my colleagues to become the second PC. It's a huge (urgently needed) change that I look forward to you covering in greater detail. Think you Dave? Nah. Thank you Dave :) PS EdB Rules!
Finding the solution of re-using plastic waste for building materials very good, i think this is hardly a *circular* path for the plastic, it's just a second (hopefully long term) use of the plastic. Once demolition of the building happens, most likely the whole volume will be dumped in.a landfill. I doubt that the blocks would be separated and used a 2nd time (which would be ideal). Or maybe plastic recycling is better than now. But for now, this is 2nd use, not circular. Great, but just shifting the problem into the future.
Dave - YES!!! Closed loop economy. I believe the primary issue with capitalism today is no companies really deal with any waste post-sale. It is up to the consumer to deal with that, who simply discards it into rubbish. I believe all companies that make stuff should be forced to design how to receive, refurbish, reuse, and/or recycle the various components in their products. This will form the basis for closed-loop, and I believe an additional profitable "upstream" economy. So, let's say you buy a coffee maker, use it, and it stops working? You would return it to the store you bought it from and it would find it's way back to Cuisinart. Cuisinart (who would already have the infrastructure built to receive and break down the product) would diagnose that the heating element is bad, but the rest of the coffee maker is absolutely fine. They would replace the heating element, give the coffee maker a shine, and resell it as new. Cuisinart would return the heating element to the manufacturer. That manufacturer might find that the only thing that is bad is the element itself. They would replace the element and sell it as new - back to Cuisinart (or whoever). The heating element company would return the element back to their supplier, and the cycle continues until it ends up at the materials manufacture who would prepare it and incorporate it into their new products. This model would generate additional revenue, because the company that is the most prepared to reuse or recycle is the company that built it in the first place. That doesn't happen today, because there is no "upstream" process to get those products to their original manufacturers; and companies don't generally build out the infrastructure for dealing with incoming products because it's all about getting products to market (i.e. "downstream") and its seen as extra expense rather than potential extra revenue. One day perhaps!!
i looked into donut economics last year. Id love to see it tested out and for it to be proven. It just makes so much sense to me. I do feel i didnt fully grasp everything however, so i look forwards with anticipation to a video on the theory
Jeebus, I've been saying someone should do this for years; I must be a _jeenyoose!_ 😄 It started when I was getting sick of replacing our garden fence panels every five years or so and wondered if it would be possible to add dyes to shredded waste plastic, place it in a form, add heat or pressure (or both) and produce an everlasting fence panel, posts, panelling, garden sheds, et cetera. I even wondered if it could be made into something structural like joists (blocks never occurred to me), although I had doubts about its strength and fire resistance. Huge kudos to all the people out there actually making this happen... now, when do I get my pre-coloured, wood-textured, maintenance-free, everlasting, indestructibl0rz fence panels?! 😂
The only downside to plastic block building is their flammability. During the last wave of bushfires here in Oz, structures designed to stop erosion under indigenous rock art, 000s of years old, made of recycled plastic, caught fire, sooting & incinerating the very thing they were designed to protect. I’m much more inclined to hempcrete or compressed earth blocks because of the high fire danger of where I live, & to reduce my plastic consumption as well.
I love this kind of solution, the main problem is the mix nature of the plastic. To make it durable or reliable, I guess it's not the same building a brick from pvc than from bag
If it's foamed for insulation the structural properties aren't so critical. Also, if it's made into plastic timber with all the fibres teased along the long orientation, the lack of cross-polymer linkages won't be so critical either.
These are some of the best solutions I’ve seen for waste plastic, removing the need to transport waste for disposal over large distances and seemingly having relatively low energy use for production. Building certifications and education of the building industry on best practice use cases are key as you said. Sustainability and circular reuse are vital - will check out doughnuts 😊
Working on solid waste management here in the Philippines, the biggest issue is segregation at source. Solutions like the one presented here are only possible with good segregation. Can you make a video on the various solutions segregation at source in poorer countries ?
The use of waste plastics to make bricks sounds very sensible but will they be fire resistant, would they expand and contract a lot, how much would they deform under tensile loading and compression? Would the bricks be glued together or plastic welded? With the number of companies involved in this field, I’m sure they will find a way to overcome these issues.
About twothousand years ago there was still puzzolane (strains of "flexible stone") available in some volcanic regions, but later hardly anyone mixed plastic fibres into concrete for other abilities. Like safety working shoes that have steel caps to prevent damage to toes but hardly anyone has caps made of plastic fibre so a heavy bump won't squeeze into the toes like steel would, even causing the problem how to re-open the steel cap. And there are already a few organisms found having learned to digest some plastic types, so if those were app-roach-able in some crannies in the concrete, those little animals might start to eat that concrete that has plastic in it and i'd pessimisticly assume that there will be strange mycel or fungi "when we all would be gone". With so many plastic types i'd "guarantee" that such a building structure will be devoured within decades, but then there's nobody helping as warranty service, the firm will be gone then. Even though some aspects of the idea might sound useful. Where i live we have to purchase plastic bags to collect plastic and bring it "because this isn't possible in a different way due to the handling" some frustrated bureaucracy woman answered to me. And there is a lot of stuff that can rot if it's deposited at a place for more then three years (perhaps with dirty stuff mixed in).
I like the idea of using plastic for building blocks so long as the building is not in a high fire zone!. Also, I've seen reports of using waste plastic in roadways which is a very bad idea as the tires will aerosolize microplastics into the air, soil, and water.
Precious plastics are streets ahead by virtue of their use of sorted plastics. The random mixture of waste such as in the building block is a dead end preventing further re-use.
Exactly this. The structural characteristics of different plastics all smooshed together offers no uniformity and therefore will never be consistent enough to ever be reliable.
Wow. Lots of naysayers on this one. The use of plastics are not going anywhere anytime soon. Alternatives for waste plastic disposal / recycling are sorely needed in our society. Innovative solutions such as these need to be encouraged and supported in expanding their feasibility and viability. Good for these guys and sure hope more get on board.
OMG: "Lack of essential nutrients in my plant-based diet." I had to play that three times I enjoyed it so much. The rest of the content was welcome news as well, thank you!
The solution must start with building the disposal and recycling costs into plastic. I propose a feedback loop, the added disposal cost is proportional to the plastic showing up in landfills and the environment. Simple to implement and administer and the everyone ends up with a financial incentive to conserve, reuse etc.
I consider this episode as your best so far .... A positive broad brush approach for our world, using what we "have" today as consumers and end products to repurpose ... as the ever looming dead end to humans broad brush approach of consumption, regardless of "source" at the expense of the planet.
Dave, you're awesome. Your patience with all the negative comments you read throughout this series of videos is impressive beyond belief, and the humor you've used in this video shows a bit of how you've coped with it. Keep it up, man; you're doing great work.
Thank you once again for your excellent communication skills and making this all more accessible to those who aren't normally engaged in this sort of thinking. For me, years ago, I decided the best thing I could do was to not use plastics as much as possible. I don't think it is a good material no matter how useful it might be, the cost in damage of it outweighs how useful it is and no amount of recycling makes that determination work out any better. The more recycling that happens to it the more particles and junk it scatters about and leaves behind. Natural materials like stone and wood have recycling pathways built right into the world. They work well enough. Glass is also a great material. If you need fabrics use plant fibers (hemp does much better than cotton). etc. Recycling is not the answer for plastic. Yes we do need to clean up the mess we're making, but the way to get that done is to stop making the plastic to begin with.
Great video as always. I'm somewhat skeptical of the plastic blocks as a building material. I've seen several runs at this, and they all seem to have a problem creating a product that's consistent enough to make regulators happy. I'm not for eliminating the idea, I'm just not going to wait with bated breath. As for the mind wandering problem, I don't think it is one. I often say I like to let my mind wander about without adult supervision, sometimes it comes back with some interesting things. 🤔
In Canada, and just down the street from me, there is a new house foundation being made from interlocking styrofoam (?) blocks which have an open core for concrete to be poured into. The concrete and some steel rods provide the strength and the foam provides weather-proof insulation as well as a speedy way to create the forms for poured concrete. So plastic is already being used in new foundation constructions. If the waste-plastic mixes could be homogenized, this "hollow blocks" approach might remove a few of the traditional objections.
Great video Dave. Waste plastics are surface carbons whose value are not being recognized. Proper value assign would result in drivers for proper collection, handling and subsequent reuse. At Aduro we are tackling this challenge through innovation in deconstructing polymers. Helping to bring this resource back into the circular economy and outside of our environments.
Two questions on my mind, first fire hazard. Plastics will burn like oil, which means lots of smoke. Second, decomposition. Some plastics might decompose and release gases or liquids that can be toxic.
Great video, I was wondering about this idea myself. I hope these blocks become widely adopted by construction companies. I often think loading all this plastic onto multiple giant spaceships and aiming them at the sun would be great if we could afford to do it but ...alas..not practical.
Sounds great! I been for years, the problem with plastics, we do not honor them enough, our disrespect has led to pollution the plant with mountains of plastics - much is "use once and throw away". The main problem I see is these building material need for to sealed to not to shed the microfibers and nasty PFAS and other pollutes for the hundreds of years they will last.
7:32 In my experience with builders and tradespeople this more than anything is the real hurdle for new building materials. The people that grew up in that industry, at least in the rural US, that are in their 30's and 40's now and especially those that are second or third generation tradespeople will never even look at a presentation or spec sheet for anything like this regardless of the testing and certification the material has gone through.
I like the underlying ideas you use to present possible solutions to varying problems. Especially since the problems are existential. You bring bits of hope that ingenuity might get a chance to play out in real time.
I love a lot of the outside-the-box thinking in these videos, and watch your videos regularly as a person who's a science teacher and someone who has a high-level general knowledge about all the Sciences this is one of the few that I really doubt has any chance of working. When you add things into concrete they need to interact in positive ways with it in several different ways. We can add fibers to concrete like we do in hempcrete, or carbon fiber concrete because the cement in concrete and those fibers are both capable of being wet by water forming a tight interaction between the filler and the calcium and silicon hydrates in the cement. Most Plastics are difficult to nearly impossible to wet and they're going to essentially be bubbles from a strength standpoint. They're not going to stick to and add structural reinforcements. Another reason why you do it to increase the tensile strength because the material you're putting in has a good tensile strength and is in fibrous form that runs along way. Do plastic can form fibers these recycled the Plastics would have to be melted down and then spun into strong fibers that's not possible with a lot of plastics. Plastic waste is probably going to be mixed in as filler particles and is going to reduce the strength instead of increase it. We do ad killers that are particulate like sand, gravel and cobblestones to concrete, and that helps straight propagation of cracks cracks because those stones are much harder than the cement. Again plastic can't really do this because it has no attachment to the cement, is not really stronger than the cement depending upon the plastic, and is often deformable so it doesn't block The Strain on the material, the stretching of the material
That is a fair point, but atleast from my understanding of the video, the concept isnt to mix it with concrete but to make the blocks purely out of shredded plastic that is fused together using heat pressure and steam
@@gkes4617 I'm sorry I should have watch to the very end. You can make plastic construction bricks. I know some houses that have literally been built using styrofoam and some support beams. They can actually be built fairly sturdy that way with very good insulation values
@@michalchik Well, concrete fills those foam blocks, if it’s insulating concrete forms (ICFs) you’re talking about. So, it’s the rebar and concrete that support loads. The forms contain the concrete (for the most part, unless the person pouring it didn’t properly support the forms from the outside or poured too much vertically, causing a blow-out).
one to way to implement these plastic blocks could be to use them to build sheds, garages, garden walls etc..at least that way your using up some plastic waste and your saving on using concrete - may even be able to use them as lintels in houses (a lintel is a beam that is usually placed above windows and doors. The lintel's main job is to support the load from the structure above it.), just a few things off my head
I don't think producing plastic clothing is a good option. Apparently much of the microplastics in the oceans stem from plastic clothing being washed. Thus in my opinion we should massively reduce that or better outright ban it in some cases.
@@punkdigerati it certainly would. Many big endeavors have paved our way. Imagine how far we came the last hundred years. It is a question of political and social will.
For fabrics, the less processed the better for it breaking down safely. For example: Linen, wool, cotton, bamboo (not bamboo viscose), which biodegrade as many things have evolved to eat them. Rayon and other forms of viscose made from plant cellulose (wood, bamboo, cotton), which will eventually break down in warm damp conditions as they’re made from cellulose and again, many things can eat it. We’re still talking several to dozens of years, but better than hundreds of, possibly more, years. Perhaps polymers like polylactic acid (PLA), often marketed as compostable, but they’re not compostable in an industrial process (high temperature, high humidity), so these will need to be collected and sent to such facilities. Otherwise, they’re almost as long-lived as full synthetics. Lastly, full synthetics like nylon (polyamide), polyester, polyethylene, which very few things or nothing can manage to eat
Easiest way to do that is for the industry to switch from fast fashion to switch to durable, natural fibers. Much of the clothing produced ends up as waste long before it is actually no longer usable. REDUCE, reuse recycle :)
in numerous conversations I've suggested this very concept and been called any number of combinations of "dumb" and "crazy"... glad to know I'm not a TOTAL idiot...
You'd get more plastic for less effort by mining the mouths of rivers that are the source of most of the garbage. The great patch is actually very diffuse.
I enjoy this channel, the what you write plastic doughnut is an idea, i personally think is great. With all of the info stating that most plastics are not or can not be recycled for what ever reason, as a simple building material, makes sense. The question becomes, how toxic it is to air and water quality given that most humans have some level of plastic residue in our bodies already. in my opinion if this is a solid way to reduce the problem with plastic waste, then e need to start grabbig all the stuff in our ocean, the great garbage patch and start making these bricks now and in massive scale
I remember a company which does a lego similar system, much more sophisticated compared to this. It was shown in a report a few years ago, the company exists for 20? years so something like that but did not sold much. Back then and esp. here I wonder how this will impact the air quality in the building etc, I mean when I remember correctly the one I have seen back then was one type of recycled material and at least you have an idea how it will react, but just shreded material is a bit to simple. Seeing how they build the walls I also have to add, wow looks like they have no experience with constraction or are just... even I know you don't just lie it on top of each other. The steal bar not really helps, IMO.
6:53 To be fair, no one wants another Grenfell. Not to mention all the other homes that have been built with the same flammable cladding that now can be sold.
Don't forget, that in the curing the concrete absorbed a lot of the CO2, released in the atmosphere in the process of creating the concrete. Just to organize a way for "cooking" the source materials for ciment. ;)
My worry would be fumes given off in a house fire. Even if the blocks don’t burn when a blow torch is used, that’s very different from a massive house fire that burns for minutes or hours. If they give off toxic smoke then they are a menace in buildings.
3 minutes in, a huge advantage of the plastic blocks is huge insulation performance, I would say they can't be used for load walls, only for section walls or simply as insulation.
I like the plastic bricks idea, I was hoping to go with compressed Earth blocks which cut out cement usage in the structure, not the foundation, by 95%. But consuming local waste is in that positive instead of a neutral. I wonder if the bricks are sufficient to make arcing roofs.
I've ruminated over melting our household plastic waste and mixing in sand or other granular material to make building 'mass' if not exactly building material. There are obvious hazards; the obvious being flammable and toxic fumes. I figured that the least risky methodology would be to (solar) heat the 'ballast' material first and then add plastic until the desired consistency is achieved.
