“We want to make EPFL labs aware of how much plastic they use”

The medals given out at this spring’s EPFL-UNIL PolySports tournament will be made from Plast It Back recycled plastic, for the second year in a row. Plast It Back – an initiative that emerged a few years ago out of a project carried out under EPFL’s humanities and social sciences program – is now part of the Zero Emission Group student club. Students recover plastic waste from SV labs and use it to create all sorts of objects, and they have lots of other ideas for taking their recycling efforts even further.

“We want to make EPFL labs aware of how much plastic they use,” says Noémie Hu, one of the Plast It Back team leaders. “The objects we create serve as visual reminders, calling attention to the scope of the problem. Unfortunately, when it comes to research, it’s hard to cut back on plastic consumption. But we still hope to change people’s attitudes.”

Plast It Back’s recycling process consists of grinding down plastic waste to form pellets and then sheets, which are subsequently molded into a variety of objects: medals, cups, clocks, boxes and more. Here, students work closely with EPFL’s Discovery Learning Laboratory (DLL) in engineering, using the DLL’s spaces and equipment. The students had applied for support from the DLL to build a full plastic recycling system on the Lausanne campus. “Some parts of our request were approved – both the Student Prototyping and Outreach Tank (SPOT) and the Student Kreativity and Innovation Laboratory (SKIL) acquired machines for recycling the plastic filament and other objects from 3D printing,” says Gaëlle Verdon, another Plast It Back team leader.

Switzerland and EPFL are big plastic users

Just 20% of the world’s plastic is recycled. Switzerland uses three times more of the material than neighboring European countries but recycles 30% less.³ And according to information the students obtained from Stephen Poplineau, the head of EPFL’s waste collection center, EPFL generated 53.4 metric tons of plastic waste in 2022.

Given that Switzerland aims to be carbon neutral by 2050,⁴ incinerating plastic waste will soon no longer be an option. Instead, we need to find ways to use less, recycle more and capture the associated carbon emissions at the source. This is all part of what Plast It Back aims to do by building awareness and encouraging recycling.

Leading by example

Plast It Back students are aware that their initiative can make an impact only on a small scale. That’s why they’re encouraging EPFL to adopt School-wide measures. “We’re conducting life-cycle assessments of our medals to evaluate their overall environmental footprint,” says Benjamin Tiberghien, another Plast It Back team leader. “But our main objectives are to get people to take action and unite the EPFL community around a common goal.” Hu adds: “Our role also involves speaking with other groups and anyone else who’s interested in working with recycled materials. We can help point them in the right direction.”

Tiberghien notes that “as students we don’t really feel qualified telling experienced researchers how they should do their jobs when it comes to reducing plastic waste.” Hu goes on to explain: “We realize that with our student initiative, it’d be hard or even unrealistic to recycle all the plastic at EPFL. But given our School’s standing as a research institute, we believe it could set an example by promoting local recycling programs and reducing the amount of incinerated waste.”

A creative challenge

“EPFL labs throw away so much plastic that we were able to quickly get what we needed by asking just a few researchers,” says Tiberghien. “We already have enough plastic to last us four years!” As an example, the pipettes thrown away by SV labs every week correspond to the same volume as a 200-liter container.

Plast It Back students learn a lot – often by trial and error – as they go step by step through the design and production process. “The obstacles we run into are part of the overall learning experience,” says Verdon. Tiberghien agrees: “If the plastic sheets we produce come out curved, for example, that makes them hard to machine. So we try to understand what went wrong in our process. It’s very stimulating, and we see that even when problems arise, we’re able to find solutions.”

Students also appreciate the relaxed atmosphere among the project teams. Newcomers to the group are trained on the necessary methods as soon as they arrive. Group members who have the time teach others how to use the computer-aided design software and various machines. Students are really eager to roll up their sleeves and apply their technical know-how to the goal of sustainability. “We’re free to create our own projects from scratch,” says Hu. “It’s really gratifying to carry a project through from A to Z, and to see the medals you made from three months of intense work finally handed out.”

From theory to practice

“In the classroom, we learn a lot of theory and do a lot of calculations,” says Tiberghien. “With Plast It Back, we get to see the real-world applications with our own eyes. I took classes in polymer processing as part of my degree program in materials science, and working directly with viscous materials gave me important hands-on experience.”

Hu adds: “It’s funny to see the difference between how things should go in theory – where a process might look like it’ll take just an hour, for example – and how they actually play out in the real world! Some of us get little manual, intuitive experience at EPFL, and it’s mainly in fields that are very practice-oriented, like at ENAC. And it’s true that being inside a workshop and seeing all the different machines can be intimidating. But making things from start to finish and overcoming obstacles along the way are valuable real-world experiences. It’d be great if everyone could get this kind of hands-on education.”