Mastercard

Challenge

Mastercard is a global leader in payment solutions, working to develop a portfolio of products and solutions to address the surging plastic pollution and carbon footprint associated with the payment card industry.

Six billion payment cards are produced annually, composed predominantly of first-use polyvinyl chloride (PVC), which not only has high embodied carbon, but also presents significant economic and environmental challenges due to its complex disposal process.

Solution

In collaboration with Mastercard, the SMI Hub explored ways to shift the payment card industry from a linear model to a more sustainable, circular economy. This focused on transitioning to a more recyclable polymer – specifically, glycol-modified poly(ethylene terephthalate) (PET-G) – and examined how its properties could unlock new, more sustainable opportunities.

A chemical recycling approach was chosen to maximise resource extraction from the complex multilayered payment cards. Optimisations were conducted on the chemical breakdown of PET-G into its monomers, including their isolation and purification. The selected methods for selective catalytic depolymerisation and repolymerisation were tested at a kilogram scale using commercial-grade multi-material PET-G cards.

The successful recovery of both the embedded metal components and the polymer, without significantly compromising their properties, supported the viability of these straightforward recycling strategies for establishing a sustainable closed-loop system.

Impact

The impact and feasibility of the methodologies developed were further evaluated from the economic and environmental perspective through rigorous techno-economic analysis (TEA) and life-cycle assessment (LCA).

Findings revealed scenarios in which environmental impacts could be substantially reduced, with potential for economic feasibility at scale as well. The outcomes generated from the research are vastly adaptable beyond the payment card economy, into, for example, recycling of other polyesters and complex multi-layered materials.