The influence of adhesives on recycling

The finiteness of many resources made it necessary to think about how to save them by developing resource-saving technologies, e.g. to recycle materials. To execute the idea of recycling, it is necessary to think about a material recycling of the used products when designing them. This means that all additives of the process have to be designed in the way they do not disturb the later material recycling. Today, adhesives play a decisive role in the production of almost every good, especially for mass-produced articles and therefore it is important to choose adhesives that do not disturb the recycling of the primary materials. In recycling processes which take place at high temperatures (e.g. glass or metal recycling), the influence of the adhesives usually formed by organic polymers can be ignored. In the field of low temperature recycling technologies, the question whether an adhesive is recycling-friendly or not can only be answered by knowing its application and the recycling process. If the recycling processes are known, it is easy to chose suitable adhesives. For plastic and paper recycling, there are a lot of adhesives today that fulfill the requirements of recyclers. In order to simplify recycling for the future, adhesives with "switches enclosed" are being developed which will allow us to disbond system components into separate parts after use for reuse or material recycling. (C) 2005 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.