ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Membr. Sci. Technol.
Sec. Membrane Modules and Processes
Internal System Dynamics Modeling of Membrane Technology Deployment in Australia's Plastic Packaging Circular Economy: Why the 70% Recovery Target Requires Strategic Elimination, Not Universal Processing
Swinburne University of Technology, Hawthorn, Australia
Select one of your emails
You have multiple emails registered with Frontiers:
Notify me on publication
Please enter your email address:
If you already have an account, please login
You don't have a Frontiers account ? You can register here
Abstract
ABSTRACT Introduction: National Packaging Targets mandate 70% plastic packaging recovery by 2025, yet recovery rates have stagnated at 24-27% despite voluntary commitments and $690 million investment (2018-2024). Membrane technology offers potential to process contaminated flexible plastics, but deployment economics remain uncertain. Methods: The study developed a system dynamics model with eight interconnected feedback loops governing Australia's plastic packaging circular economy (2015-2040). The model distinguishes rigid plastics (bottles, containers) from flexible plastics (films, pouches), incorporates empirical cost structures ($800/tonne mechanical vs $19,500/tonne membrane), and integrates policy levers (EPR, CDS, elimination mandates). Historical validation against Australian Plastics Flows and Fates data (2015-2024) achieved <8% error. Five scenarios were simulated to 2040. Results: Model validation reproduced voluntary approach failures and the REDcycle collapse. Scenario analysis reveals attempting 70% recovery through universal processing (Scenario 3) costs $1.18 billion annually while achieving only 57% due to exponential cost escalation above 60%. An '80/15/5 strategy' (Scenario 4) eliminating 80% of unnecessary flexible formats achieves 68% recovery at $510 million annually—2.3 times cheaper with 11 percentage points higher recovery. Marginal costs remain under $25 million per percentage point with elimination versus over $50 million without. Discussion: Flexible plastic divide is fundamental, not transitional. Rigid plastics exhibit profitable recycling activating growth loops, while flexible plastics face catastrophic losses triggering constraint loops. Elimination costs $130 per tonne and saves $12.4 billion annually in avoided processing—a 150:1 benefit-cost ratio. EPR frameworks enabling elimination are essential; voluntary approaches have failed systematically.
Summary
Keywords
Australia, Circular economy, Extended producer responsibility, Membrane technology, Plastic packaging, Policy Analysis, system dynamics
Received
11 December 2025
Accepted
08 January 2026
Copyright
© 2026 Melles. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
*Correspondence: Gavin Melles
Disclaimer
All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.