Environmental protection issues are at the forefront of the vast majority of the media and public opinion. The study in question revealed the life cycle of a product commonly used in the home, the bottle of fresh pasteurised milk. The materials used for the manufacturing of the bottles are PET (PolyEthylene Terephthalate), plastic derived from fossil resources, and PLA (PolyLactic Acid), bioplastic derived from sugar cane, therefore from renewable resources. The life cycle of the bottles was carried out by highlighting the extraction phase of raw materials, the production of polymer, bottle, other packaging and distribution of milk and lastly, final disposal, excluding the phase of use, not significant for the purposes of this study. The studies were focused on two disposal scenarios, the current scenario and the one that is likely to take place in 10 years. In the current disposal scenario, there is no clear reduction in environmental impact from the comparison of the materials examined.With reference to the 2030 disposal scenario, the PLA turns out to be much more environmentally friendly.
The reduction of environmental impact is today the main challenge of the ceramic industry that is always more focusing on materials in line with the principles of economic and environmental sustainability. In this context, this study addresses the implementation of a Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) on the production of ceramic sanitaryware, based on a cradle-to-grave analysis. Specifically, the process was considered from raw materials until the product is manufactured, excluding the disposal phase except for process waste. The analysis of the impact assessment considers three different scenarios: (i) The first examines the current state; (ii) the second considers the recovery of fired waste and water as well as the replacement of firing and annealing ovens with new generation ovens; (iii) the third, in addition to the technologies used in the second, proposes the use of a photovoltaic system to produce green energy and, additionally, a "plant" energy recovery system. The results show how production processes have a considerable impact on the environment, in terms of energy consumption and materials. Moreover, the use of a photovoltaic system together with the recovery of water allows a significant reduction of environmental impacts. In contrast, the crushing processes for the recovery of fired waste worsen the environmental performance of the plant, because of the high consumption of electricity. Therefore, by improving the waste recovery system and adopting the solutions of the third scenario in terms of energy savings, it would be possible to reduce the environmental burden of the production system considerably. At the same time, the use of additional equipment and production processes increases the costs of the manufacturing and has a significant impact on maintenance.
The present study investigates the behavior of solid cellular structures in polylactic acid (PLA) achieved by FDM technology (fusion deposition modelling). The geometries are permanently deformed by compressive stress and then subjected to shape recovery through the application of a thermal stimulus. The structures are submitted to medium–high and medium–low compression stresses, evaluating the mechanical properties and the absorption energy as the number of cycles varies. The study shows that the ability to absorb energy is related to the density of the model, as well as the degree of damage observed, which increases with increasing number of load cycles. The strongest geometry is the lozenge grid, which is the most reliable. It shows no damage with increasing compression cycles and keeps its capability to absorb energy almost constant. The increase in lozenge grid density leads to an improvement in both mechanical strength and absorption energy, as well as a lower incidence of microcracks in the geometry itself due to the repeated load cycles. These results open up a broad spectrum of applications of custom-designed solid cellular structures in the field of energy absorption and damping.
The present study investigates the behavior of solid cellular structures in polylactic acid (PLA), created using FDM technology (Fusion Deposition Modelling). The geometries are permanently deformed by compressive stress and then subjected to the recovery of the shape, through the application of a thermal stimulus. The structures are analyzed for medium-high and medium-low compression stresses, evaluating the mechanical properties and the absorption energy as the number of cycles varies. The study shows that the ability to absorb energy is related to the density of the model, as well as the degree of damage suffered, which increases with increasing number of load cycles. The strongest geometry is the Lozenge grid, which is the most reliable, because it shows no damage with increasing compression cycles and keeps its absorption rate almost constant. The increase in Lozenge grid density leads to an improvement in both mechanical strength and absorption energy, as well as a lower incidence of microcracks in the geometry itself due to the repeated load cycles.
The aim of this paper is to study the mechanical behavior of corrugated board boxes, focusing attention on the strength that the same boxes are able to offer in compression under stacking conditions. A preliminary design of the corrugated cardboard structures starting from the definition of each individual layer, namely the outer liners and the innermost flute, was carried out. For this purpose, three distinct types of corrugated board structures that include flutes with different characteristics, namely the high wave (C), the medium wave (B) and even the micro-wave (E), were considered. First, experimental tests were carried out to determine the mechanical properties of the different layers of the corrugated board structures. Tensile tests were performed on samples extracted from the paper reels used as base material for the manufacturing of the liners and flutes. Instead, Edge Crush Test (ECT) and Box Compression Test (BCT) were directly performed on the corrugated cardboard structures. Secondly, a parametric Finite Element (FE) model to allow, on a comparative basis, the study of the mechanical response of the three different types of corrugated cardboard structures was developed. Lastly, a comparison between the available experimental results and the outputs of the FE model was carried out, with the same model being also adapted to evaluate additional structures where the E micro-wave was usefully combined with the B or C wave in a double-wave configuration.
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