When you think about the life of a motorcyclist and how many helmets they go through, there's an undeniable amount of waste attached to each lid. Even if a rider hasn't crashed in or damaged a helmet, most manufacturers recommend that riders replace them every 5-7 years. Strange, then, that it's taken so long for a manufacturer to come up with a solution for this problem, but Dainese, the owner of AGV Helmets, has one.
Life Impacto is a solution designed to change the linear life cycle of motorcycle helmets. It focuses on overcoming the challenges of how to dispose of helmets sustainably and creating a circular process based on selective dissolution recycling. But it's not just Dainese Group, the project is being rolled out by a consortium of five Italian companies including Innovandoo, Re-sport, Mistano&Stracuzzi, and Università di Bologna.
The ability to make this project work lies in an innovative recycling plant that enables the separation of the key plastic materials (ABS, EPS, and PC) that a helmet is composed of. Then, these materials can be reused in the creation of a new helmet.
According to Dainese, the goal of this project "is to implement a proactive approach to managing end-of-life products, preventing them from becoming waste and developing a sustainable, efficient process to separate and recycle the polymeric materials of which helmet are composed, as well as using the materials obtained through recycling in the manufacture of new helmets or other "green" products."
The new recycling process has the potential to substantially reduce waste and recover the raw materials needed to make new helmets. For example, with 5,000 recycled helmets, the process can extract 3,700 kilograms of ABS, 1,056 kilograms of EPS, and more than 637 kilograms of PC. Even better, using this process results in a 60% reduction in CO2 emissions, a 60% reduction in electricity consumption, and a 50% reduction in water consumption.
I think we can all agree the numbers are very promising; I just wonder if riders would be slower to buy a helmet made from recycled materials, regardless of what safety standards it meets. Let us know if you'd be put off from buying a lid made from recycled materials or feel more inclined to buy one.
