Case Study

Collaborating Across Industries to Effectively Recycle Healthcare Plastics

In 2020, the global healthcare plastics market was 32 billion pounds, and market analysts project growth to 48 billion pounds by 2025. Most of that material is being disposed of by landfill or incineration even though 85% of the waste material is not hazardous.

In light of these challenges, hospitals and clinical product suppliers are striving to identify creative strategies to improve healthcare plastics recycling rates in hospitals. In 2023, Deaconess Midtown Hospital, located in Evansville, Indiana, partnered with Evansville Packaging Supply, a local collection and sortation partner, advanced recycler Nexus Circular, and clinical product manufacturer Berry Global to pilot a healthcare plastics recycling program to reduce incinerated and landfilled plastic wastes.

The successes of their efforts serve as an important example to other healthcare facilities seeking to mitigate environmental impacts and make measured progress in plastic waste reduction.

Dedication to Meaningful Impact

This case study explores how local partnerships played a key role in the success of the Deaconess healthcare recycling program. Working together, the team was able to set up an effective plastic collection program within the hospital, transport the collected material to EPS for proper sorting, and deliver the sorted materials to Nexus Circular who then utilizes a pyrolysis-based advanced recycling process to convert the sorted healthcare plastics into pyrolysis oil.

Berry Global, Nexus Circular, and Evansville Packaging Services are all vital to the success of the recycling program and are testament to the importance of partnership and community engagement for meaningful impact.

Collaborating Across Industries to Effectively Recycle Healthcare Plastics Case Study
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Conclusion

The healthcare plastic recycling initiative undertaken by Berry Global, Deaconess Midtown Hospital, Nexus Circular, and EPS represents a step toward a more circular healthcare plastics system. By identifying and addressing the challenges associated with healthcare plastic waste management and implementing a comprehensive recycling program, this collaboration demonstrated key success factors from a viable model that could be replicated in other healthcare systems.

The team’s dedication to refining and expanding this program underscores its potential to reduce the environmental impact of healthcare plastics and serves as a testament to the power of collaboration in addressing pressing healthcare industry environmental challenges.