• Korean Chemical Engineering Research
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• v.61 no.4
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• pp.584-590
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• 2023

In this study, we focus on the recycling of cardboard waste and sugarcane bagasse (SCB) for the preparation of carboxymethyl cellulose (CMC) and its conversion into a biodegradable film. Sodium alginate (SA) was added to form a biodegradable composite film. SA was used to increase film permeability. Glycerol, which is a plasticizer, was used to increase the tensile strength (TS) and film expansion. To characterize the CMC, X-ray diffraction, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, and scanning electron microscopy were used. The addition of olive oil to the CMC-SA matrix highlighted its antimicrobial property against Escherichia coli (E. coli) and Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus). A slight decrease in tensile strength was observed with the addition of olive oil (OO), which improved the functional properties of the control films as well as lowered moisture content and water solubility. But considering all other factors, the composite films obtained from sugarcane bagasse and cardboard waste incorporated with olive oil are suitable for applications in the field of food packaging.

• International Journal of Computer Science & Network Security
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• v.21 no.8
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• pp.65-70
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• 2021

Waste accumulation is becoming a significant challenge in most urban areas and if it continues unchecked, is poised to have severe repercussions on our environment and health. The massive industrialisation in our cities has been followed by a commensurate waste creation that has become a bottleneck for even waste management systems. While recycling is a viable solution for waste management, it can be daunting to classify waste material for recycling accurately. In this study, transfer learning models were proposed to automatically classify wastes based on six materials (cardboard, glass, metal, paper, plastic, and trash). The tested pre-trained models were ResNet50, VGG16, InceptionV3, and Xception. Data augmentation was done using a Generative Adversarial Network (GAN) with various image generation percentages. It was found that models based on Xception and VGG16 were more robust. In contrast, models based on ResNet50 and InceptionV3 were sensitive to the added machine-generated images as the accuracy degrades significantly compared to training with no artificial data.

• Journal of Community Nutrition
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• v.4 no.2
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• pp.130-135
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• 2002

The purposes of this study were to quantify and compare the kind and amount of solid waste generated in two school foodservice operations located in urban and rural areas. A waste stream analysis was conducted to quantify and characterize the kind of waste in the production and service parts of each operation. The SPSS 10.0 for window was used for data analysis. Non-parametric test (Mann-Whitney) was adopted to determine if significant differences exist in amounts of waste generated in the urban school and the rural school. An average of 415 meals, including 43 adult meals, were served daily in the urban school, while an average of 177 meals, including 24 adult meals, were served daily in the rural school. Food waste generated in the production part in the urban school composed approximately 87% and 45%, while that in the rural school composed 71% and 28% by weight and volume, respectively. Waste per meal was not significantly different between the urban school and the rural school in the production part except the cardboard waste. The total waste per meal at lunch was 154g or 465m1 in the urban school and 51g or 334m1 in the rural school. Students in the urban school discarded significantly more food waste and milk than students in the rural school did. The research results suggest that school foodservice dietitians should evaluate the acceptability of menu items based on food waste per meal, and assess the feasibility of implementing a plan for recycling packaging waste and composting organic waste.

• KOREAN JOURNAL OF PACKAGING SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY
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• v.27 no.3
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• pp.149-158
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• 2021

Advances in food packaging play an important role in keeping food manufacturing and food supply safe. Food packaging facilitates the storage, handling, transportation and preservation of food, and also contributes to the minimization of food waste. On the other hand, food packaging materials have high production volumes, short usage times, and accelerate the occurrence of environmental problems related to waste. The circular economy has already been introduced to pursue sustainability through resource conservation and recycling, and to reduce waste and carbon emissions. By activating an eco-friendly economic system that minimizes resource depletion and environmental pollution, reducing, reusing, recycling and redesigning the goals of the circular economy will reduce the impact of food packaging on the environment. This review focused on the safety aspects of recycled food packaging as recycling is currently considered an important means of packaging waste management. Assessing the safety of recycled packaging is very important because recycling can increase the levels of potentially hazardous chemicals in packaging and in the food after they are migrated. Various food packaging materials such as plastic, paper and cardboard, aluminum, steel, and multi-material multi-layers packaging are commonly used, but only the recycling safety of plastic food packaging materials, which is the most used and has a significant increase in post-use problem, is discussed in this review.

• Journal of Korean Society for Atmospheric Environment
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• v.22 no.E2
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• pp.49-56
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• 2006

This pilot study focuses on emissions characterization of air pollutants produced from incineration of some municipal solid wastes (MSWs). The MSWs incinerated by an electric furnace maintained up to $600^{\circ}C$ included food, paper, and plastic wastes. The pollutants analyzed in this study included concentrations of volatile organic compounds (VOCs), bottom ash contents, and heavy metals extracted from the bottom ash of each waste. The VOCs identified were classified based on their chemical structure. The total emissions of VOCs produced from incineration of the papers were identified as the highest followed by those from the plastics and the food wastes. Aliphatic alkenes were major VOC compounds produced from incineration of plastic or food wastes, while furans were major VOCs produced from incineration of papers. The second major VOCs produced from incineration of food, plastics, and papers were aromatics. In particular, hazardous air pollutants such as benzene were produced with considerable amount of emission concentration. The bottom ash contents of papers were usually much higher than those of food or plastic wastes. The bottom ash contents produced from incineration of food and plastics were much lower than those of other MSWs. In analysis of heavy metals extracted by an ultrasonic method from the bottom ashes of the papers, high concentrations of heavy metals were identified from incineration of newspapers and box (cardboard). In addition, it was identified that the general public might be exposed to considerable amounts of lead concentrations during incineration processes and uses of paper cup and from ashes.

• Korean Journal of Environmental Agriculture
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• v.20 no.3
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• pp.135-142
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• 2001

Compostable household wastes(mainly food wastes), after waste papers and cardboard being removed, were daily fed into small bins and mixed thoroughly while the air was supplied into the bin. Three small bins were employed: in case I, only recycled compost was composted, after being once fed at the beginning of composting, in case II, compostable household wastes(less than 50 mm) torn roughly by the hands with recycled compost, and in case III, compostable household wastes(less than 2 mm) ground by a kitchen mixer for vegetables with recycled compost. The straight-line was maintained between the wet or the dry residual mass of composting mixture versus composting time date(the coefficient of determination $R^2{\geq}0.98$ for the wet and $R^2{\geq}0.90$ for the dry). The decomposition rate of each composted material was estimated during composting. The total weight reduction rate after 30 days was 67.86% and 66.14% for case II and III, respectively. For case II, the daily weight reduction 6.82% and the daily decomposition rate 8.81% with the composting mixture, but the daily weight reduction rate was 56.43% and the daily decomposition rate 19.26% with only compostable household wastes. For case III, the daily reduction rate was 6.93% and the daily decomposition rate 7.70% with the composting mixture, but the daily weight reduction rate was 53.30% and the daily decomposition rate 22.95% with only compostable household wastes. The physicochemical characteristics of composting mixture did not show much difference between case II and III as was expected.