RedSands Plastics, Bottle to Building, A Single-use Plastic Lifecycle

Bottle to Building

A Single-use Plastic Lifecycle

OFF-SITE People recycle their waste plastic under the premise that it will be correctly processed

OFF-SITE Recycling is often sent to landfill, brownfield sites or illegally dumped

OFF-SITE Waste from the landfill sites travel into the water systems through urban run-off

OFF-SITE Aquatic and Submarine Drones collect plastic from the Estuary and surrounding waters

TOWER 1 Aquatic Drones deliver waste to conveyor belts

TOWER 1 Submarine Drones deliver waste to chutes up onto conveyors

TOWER 1 Conveyors meet a the main waste conveyor

TOWER 1 Conveyor delivers waste to storage container where it is collected by crane

TOWER 1 Crane moves waste from water level container into roof top hopper

TOWER 1

Waste travels down a shaft into the sorting room, here plastics and non-plastics are separated

TOWER 1

Plastics are also sorted by type LDPE/HDPE/PP/PET

TOWER 1 Sorted plastics and non-plastics fall through the floor into delivery carts

TOWER 2 Sorted plastic travels here from Tower 1, goes up to the second floor via lift

TOWER 2 Sorted plastics are shredded into flakes

TOWER 2 Flakes fall through the floor into washing machines Clean water arrive in (blue) & dirty water out (red)

TOWER 2 Washed flakes are then dried and sent back out of the building

TOWER 3

Non-Plastic waste is sent here for processing

TOWER 3 Waste is sorted, recyclable materials (metal, glass, timber, ect) are separated from general waste

TOWER 3 Non-Recyclable materials are shredded and compacted

TOWER 3 Compacted bales of waste a craned onto boats and send to the mainland for processing

TOWER 4

Plastic flakes from Tower 2 are sent here for further processing

TOWER 4 Flakes are extruded into usable pellets

TOWER 4 These pellets are stored in containers until required

TOWER 4 Pellets are used in the workshop (machines include; extrusion, injection and compression) Various products and building components are made here

TOWER 5 Sorted plastic from Tower 1 is sent here for processing

TOWER 5 Plastics are shredded, then fed through a machine which melts it down and extruded the molten plastic into building elements with a die form

TOWER 5 Building elements are brought together to create prototypes including walls and cladding systems

TOWER 5 Building blocks are combined with components made in Tower 4 to construct new parts of the site