The Center's Value Recovery Initiative (VRI) addresses the environmental and commercial issues associated with promoting responsible recovery of value from used agricultural plastics and associated products that have traditionally been considered disposable wastes. This goals are accomplished by focusing University resources and capabilities on many aspects of this pressing economic, environmental, and agricultural issue. VRI staff and affiliated researchers and educators work to develop technical solutions to used plastic management problems through research, outreach, and teaching activities. The team also addresses broader issues such as energy recovery, recycling and recyclability, extended product use, polymer composition and degradation, waste reduction, risk management, life cycle analysis, and public decision-making. The focus for such work is on multi-disciplinary projects that integrate research and outreach. On-going programs consist of VRI personnel working in collaboration with Penn State faculty and students from many departments, Cooperative Extension, and with cooperators in both the public and private sectors.

Pennsylvania and Northeast U. S. vegetable growers are facing strong competition from major production areas in the United States and other countries where environmental conditions are more favorable for high productivity and crop quality. In addition, Pennsylvania's short growing season, which includes substantial periods of temperature and moisture extremes, limits crop productivity and encourages insect and disease organisms to infest stressed crops. Use of chemical controls for weed, insect and disease control is successful, but cost of chemicals, potential for crop injury, and worker safety issues has shifted the need to look at alternative control programs including biological pest control, more controlled or modified environmental structures for intensive vegetable production and more pest resistant/tolerant vegetable varieties. Many of the current applied research programs have demonstrated the advantages and use of plastics in crop production systems. The use of plasticulture including; high tunnels (essentially unheated greenhouses), plastic mulch, drip irrigation and row covers for production of vegetables in Pennsylvania offers growers several advantages: 1) reduced temperature and moisture fluctuations during the growing season, 2)the use of biological pest control for both insect and disease control, 3) extension of the Spring and Fall growing seasons for vegetable production, 4) the production of several semi-tropical crops which grow best n a constant or more predictable temperature, 5) more precise water and nutrient application to optimize crop yield and quality, 6) reduction in the total amount of pesticides applied to the crop, and 7) an increase in worker protection standards.

We recently obtained an experimental furnace to burn pellets made from waste plastic from our farm. Below are a series of photos of the furnace. This series of photos shows a new hot water boiler technology, manufactured by GRT Company, Ltd. of Seoul , Korea . The system is currently being set up in a building at the Penn State University Horticulture Research Farm. This hot water boiler is fueled by pellets made from all types of waste plastics, initially from agricultural sources. Eventually the system will be modified to burn Penn State 's Plastofuel fuel nuggets, which are significantly larger than the pea-sized pellets currently being used.

Testing of the unit in Korea showed the system meets US EPA emissions standards, however to verify results in a field setting, further testing will begin late winter 2004, continuing for the next several years. Penn State's Energy Institute and College of Agricultural Sciences researchers will investigate combustion characteristics and efficiencies, air emissions, and overall system heat transfer using a wide array of waste plastic fuels.

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	Fig. 1. The waste plastic burner and associated parts are shown still on the shipping pallet. On the left is the burner, the control module (center), and on the right is the fuel pellet transfer pump.
	Fig. 2. The hot water boiler heating system shown in its new building. The building is being wired for electricity to run the burner and associated pumping equipment. The burner portion is on the right, and the hot water boiler containing 0.8 tons of water is the orange portion on the left.
	Fig. 3. The burner is fed with plastic pellets from the gray-colored hopper, which in turn is fed automatically from bulk storage bins via transfer tubes and a pellet transfer pump (see Fig. 1). The transfer tubes are temporarily snaked through the trusses above to keep them from being in the way.
	Fig. 4. The gray-colored control panel beneath the pellet hopper makes sure all fuel is metered as needed and all hot water is circulated as necessary.
	Fig. 5. The back end of the boiler, where a sampling port (round, black pipe cap) and an ash cleanout (behind yellow piece of tape) can be seen.
	Fig. 6. Shown still under construction on a lovely January day is the 30 x 96 foot high tunnel (left) to be heated with waste plastic. The blue building in the background houses the hot water boiler, while plans call for the greenhouse to the right to eventually be heated with the boiler.