Plastics in Packaging
After the Second World War, the plastics industry underwent incredibly fast development. There is probably no comparable sector of industry (apart perhaps from computing) which has grown so rapidly. The result is that plastics, and plastics packaging, are now an essential part of our everyday life.
The key to their success has been versatility. In packaging, plastics are used for many varied applications ranging from sterile storage of medical and pharmaceutical goods, to extending the shelf life of foodstuffs such as bread, meat and vegetables, and protecting sensitive technical products from damage. This means that plastics make a significant contribution to improving the quality of our life. At the same time they preserve valuable resources and help to save costs, as a result of their lower weight.
Plastics in Building and Construction
Of all the applications of plastics, building and construction is the second most important area, with a volume of 23 %, only coming second to packaging applications.
The average working life of all plastics applications in construction is 35 years but, depending on the specific application, this has a wide variation between 5 years (such as wallpaper) and 80 years (such as pipes).
Plastic insulation systems can also make a significant contribution to noise insulation. After pipes and insulation, the third major application area is for wall covering and flooring. The fourth-largest application area is window frames, which are made almost exclusively out of PVC.
Plastics in the Electrical Industry
The use of plastics in the electrical industry spreads to every sector. In the consumer electrical sector, we can see every day the switches, lighting fittings, wiring and equipment boxes in houses and workplaces.
Not so visible is the massive use of plastics ``behind the scenes`` in electrical engineering, stretching from the main switch right back through cabling and sub-stations, to the power generating plant. Without plastics, electricity would still be possible - but it would be much more cumbersome and costly.
In the sector of business machinery and information storage, the contribution of plastics is almost total. Computers, copiers and other business machines are housed in moulded plastics enclosures and, like TV and video, use plastics extensively in their working parts. Optical information storage media are remarkable achievements in the formulation of ultra-pure materials, and then moulding them with most extraordinary precision.
Plastics in Automotive Components
The lightness in weight of plastics has proved itself a genuine benefit to the automotive industry, not only in reducing overall weight of cars, in order to reduce fuel consumption to legislated limits, but also in allowing more sophisticated systems and components - including safety systems - to be included in the modern car, without paying the penalty of additional weight.
Without plastics, it is estimated that today`s cars would be around 200-300 kg heavier. The resulting fuel savings are estimated at 0.5 litre per 100 km which represents 750 litres for a car with a lifetime of 150,000 km.
Plastics in Sports and Leisure
Strength, flexibility, colour, high mouldability - and, above all, lightness - are the characteristics which take plastics into every sector of sport and leisure, whether it be compounds in thermoplastic elastomer soling for running shoes and trainers or carbon fibre composites for rowing skiffs; polypropylene and elastomer masks and snorkels for underwater swimmers and divers or nylon runners for in-line skates; ABS protective helmets for footballers or space age composites for racing bicycles.
Construction and assembly sets such as Lego, Playmobil and others depend on the strength and ``snap-fit`` possibilities of plastics, while soft toys are universally produced in plasticised PVC - an area where, with increasing knowledge, there is increasing care in selection and formulation of materials.
Not unlike the sporting goods sector, the toy industry is increasingly involved with plastics offering higher-performance. A very large user of ``standard`` plastics (such as polystyrene, polypropylene, polyethylene and PVC), it is a growing user now of engineering plastics such as ABS, nylon and polyacetal.
Plastics in Agriculture
This sector uses mainly ``standard`` thermoplastics, such as polyethylene and PVC, with particular emphasis on extrusion. But the development of high-tech applications in agriculture has introduced the so-called ``engineering`` plastics, such as polycarbonate, into the market in significant quantities.
The scope and applications range across many materials and processes, from the most elementary low density polyethylene film to multi-wall polycarbonate glazing panels. While making it possible to raise farm yields in the Western world, there is no doubt that the vast potential for use of plastics in the Developing World has scarcely been tapped.
