Standoff Identification of Plastic Waste Using a Low-Cost Compact Laser-Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy (LIBS) Detection System

We report the standoff/remote identification of post-consumer plastic waste by utilizing a low-cost and compact standoff laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy (ST-LIBS) detection system. A single plano-convex lens is used for collecting the optical emissions from the plasma at a standoff distance of 6.5 m. A compact non-gated Czerny–Turner charge-coupled device (CCD) spectrometer (CT-CCD) is utilized to analyze the optical response. The single lens and CT-CCD combination not only reduces the cost of the detection system by tenfold, but also decreases the collection system size and weight compared to heavy telescopic-based intensified CCD systems. All the samples investigated in this study were collected from a local recycling plant. All the measurements were performed with only a single laser shot which enables rapid identification while probing a large number of samples in real time. Furthermore, principal component analysis has shown excellent separation among the samples and an artificial neural network analysis has revealed that plastic waste can be identified within ∼10 ms only (testing time) with accuracies up to ∼99%. Finally, these results have the potential to build a compact and low-cost ST-LIBS detection system for the rapid identification of plastic waste for real-time waste management application.