Both the quantity of recycled plastics waste and of processed recyclates is continually increasing. However, there are still difficulties with the quality of the recycled plastics, which are impeding replacement of virgin material. In recent years, machinery manufacturers and plastics producers have introduced various further developments that improve the properties of recyclates as well as eliminate unpleasant odors and contaminants.

Plastics recycling is a laborious process. For the recycled material to have the necessary quality, it must first be sorted into the different plastics

Overcoming Difficulties in Plastics Recycling

Streifinger, Florian

Recycling

Umweltmanagement

Extruder

Kunststoffverarbeitung: Maschinen und Komponenten

Extrusionsanlagen

Trockner

Kunststoff-Aufbereitung

Waschen und Entfetten

Kunststoffverarbeitung: Verfahren

Trockner, Granulat-

Sortierer

Kunststoff-Recycling

Additive

Kunststoff Werkstoffe

Inspektion, Analyse und Sortierung von Rohmaterial

QualitÃ¤tssicherung

QualitÃ¤tssicherung Kunststoff

The Long Road to a Circular Economy

The global provider of advanced collection and sorting systems, celebrates its 50th anniversary and announces a “mission” for a world without waste.

Tomra founders Petter and Tore Planke in front of the company’s original logo.

Tomra Celebrates 50 Years

Henkel significantly expands partnership with social enterprise Plastic Bank. The partners opened their first three plastic waste collection centers in Cairo

Henkel and Plastic Bank opened the first three collection centers in Cairo

16:9

Polyethylen

Thermoplaste

Polyethylenterephthalat

Kunststoffhandel

Dienstleistungen

Handel

Kunststoff-Rezyklat

Henkel and Plastic Bank Open First Collection Centers in Egypt

A new chemical recycling unit at Borealis production site in Stenungsund, Sweden, is expected to commence operations in 2024.

Aerial view of Borealis production location in Stenungsund, Sweden

More Circular Base Chemicals and Plastic Products

The plastics industry has a variety of materials and technologies available for significantly reducing the ecological footprint of products. There are very few applications for which it is not possible to replace at least a portion of the fossil material with recyclates or bioplastics. Various methods, standards and software tools are available to determine what savings this can achieve.

Determining CO2 Savings from Recycled Materials and Bioplastics

Simulation

Software

Normen / Standards

Recht allgemein / sonst.

Biokunststoffe

Reducing the CO2 Footprint

Statutory recyclate quotas and the specifications of brand-name producers are weighing heavily on the packaging branch these days and turning recyclate availability into a hot issue. Some polymers are simply not available in sufficient amounts. Experts at the 31st Dresden Packaging Conference provided insights into the current situations and explained why the situation could worsen in the future.

Recyclates of many polymer types are hard to get right now.

Verpackungsmaterial

Logistik

Kreislaufwirtschaft

Hard-to-Find Recylates

Ceflex and partners PCEP, Petcore Europe, Styrenics Circular Solutions and MORE Recycling team up to understand the reality of today’s collected household packaging waste.

The study aims to understand the reality of today’s collected household packaging waste, in order to help to define and accelerate the development of infrastructure, systems and end market applications required to enable progress in delivering a circular economy.

Infrarottechnik

Elektronik

Qualitätssicherung Kunststoff

Qualitätssicherung

Study of Plastic Packaging Waste Helps to Deliver a Circular Economy

Petcore Europe, PlasticsEurope, Plastics Recyclers Europe, and VinylPlus have mutually agreed to join forces to form the organisation PolyREC. PolyREC will monitor, verify, and report their plastics recycling and uptake data in Europe.

Kunststoffverarbeitung

Lohnfertigung

PolyREC Created to Monitor Polymers Circularity

From April 13 – 16, 2021 Hanser launches international virtual trade fair D-Expo Circular Economy for professionals with a focus on sustainability, recycling, eco-design, life-cycle, and more.

D-EXPO Circular Economy will take place as a digital event from April 13 to 16, 2021

Nachhaltigkeit

Regenerieren

Kunststoff-Regenerate

Digital Trade Fair for Plastics Sustainability

Virtual MeetingPack 2021, a prelude to MeetingPack 2022, will present innovations and address the challenges of the food packaging sector on 27 May through a series of presentations and round-table discussions.

Verbände, Institutionen, Messen

Packaging Sustainability and Incorporation of Recycled Material

For a long time, chemical recycling was considered an unfinished addition to established material processes. In the meantime, however, some technologies are making the leap into large-scale industrial use: an overview of the various processes and providers.

Overview of the Various Processes and Suppliers

Polypropylen

Polyurethan

Kunststoff

Bauwesen

Baustoffe

What Is Happening in Chemical Recycling?

When processing post-consumer PET bottle flakes for reuse in bottles, the purity requirement for the material combined with the high degree of contamination of the bottle flakes make high demands on melt filtration.

The fully automatic RSFgenius back flushing filtration system is the optimum retrofit solution for Nosoplas in PET bottle flake recycling

Filtration Systems for Recycling Applications

Schmelzefilter

Plant Retrofit for Bottle to Bottle Recycling

Resilux, a leading PET bottle and preform producer, has announced a major new technology investment which will result in them doubling their bottle-to-bottle PET recycling capacity by using state of the art equipment from Erema.

A Vacunite bottle-to-bottle system will be installed at the Resilux Group Recycling competence centre in Switzerland

Sondermaschinen

Resilux Set to Double Recycling Capacity Using Erema Technology

Biodegradable plastics are special polymers designed to biodegrade after use. But conventional granulation equipment cannot handle biodegradable production rejects adequately. The new Bio-Gran technology by CMG Granulators was designed to accomplish this objective.

The range of capacities of the Bio-Gran line spans form 200 kg/h all the way to 2000 kg/h.

Recycling Made Possible with Bio-Gran

LyondellBasell starts commercial production of polymers using raw material derived from plastic waste at its Wesseling site.

The chemical company starts commercial production of polymers using raw material derived from plastic waste at Wesseling

Polymers Made from Plastic Waste

Advances in Plastics Recycling Processes Towards the Creation of a Circular Economy

The development of a functioning and efficient recycling economy is strongly dependent on the quality of the recycled plastics. New plant and process technology is promoting this development.

The development of a circular economy to address the plastic waste emergency hinges on the creation of demand for high-quality recyclates. Stadler, a leading supplier of sorting plants for the recycling industry, has experienced a shift in the market, with more than 80% of its projects for plastic recycling plants in 2020 involving significant upgrades of the facilities to meet achieve the consistent, high quality output required to enter the plastics circular economy.

Plastic is an exceptional product, with numerous benefits that have made it indispensable to modern life. Its extreme durability, however, creates a difficult end-of-life issue which needs to be addressed with urgency. The solution lies in a shift towards a circular economy where plastic is re-used or recycled, never becoming waste. The recycling industry has a central role to play in this process, with the challenge of maximizing the amount of plastic it recovers from waste and producing an output of consistent, high-quality Post-Consumer Resin (PCR) that can compete with virgin resin.

“We have to unscramble the omelet and take out again the individual ingredients,” explains Enrico Siewert, Director of Product and Market Development at Stadler. “Technology advances in the last 10 years have revolutionized the industry. Today, we are able to sort plastics very efficiently, at very high percentages. A Stadler mechanical sorting plant can achieve up to 95%. With electrostatic or washing equipment it can be close to 100%.”

A Growing Demand for Effective Plastics Recycling

Social awareness is putting growing pressure on stakeholders to change the way they operate. Public policy is increasingly requiring manufacturers to use certain percentages of plastic waste or recycled content in new products. Many big brands have made commitments to better manage the end-of-life of their plastic products and packaging.

“Manufacturers are also finding new uses for PCR, so that recycling doesn’t have to be limited to bottle-to-bottle transformation,” adds Enrico Siewert. “For example, we can make pallets with our recycled plastic. When you consider that 95% of products are transported on wooden pallets, think of the two-fold environmental benefit of converting to plastic pallets! Another innovative use of PCR is railroad ties, also replacing wood. They are extremely durable, they are not vulnerable to water and insects, and competitive in price.”

Other uses that are becoming increasingly popular are underground water treatment septic tanks, replacing concrete, and tanks for water retention plants under parking lots. Consumer-facing products include one-gallon paint pots, which in the United States have switched from steel to polypropylene made from yogurt cups and similar products.

Social pressure, policy changes, new uses for PCR: all these factors are driving a growing demand for high-quality PCR that can be converted into new products.

The recycling industry is responding to this demand, upgrading its facilities to achieve the consistency and high quality needed for PCR to enter the plastics circular economy, and to increase their processing capacity.

Stadler is at the heart of this evolution: “We develop the advanced technology recycling plants need,” explains Enrico Siewert. “We are constantly innovating and developing new processes, adapting our customers’ plants to their changing needs. We are seeing first hand that the industry is stepping up to meet this new demand: last year, plant upgrades and expansions accounted for more than 80% of our projects in the plastics sector, an increase in excess of 38% compared to 2019.”

An issue that has slowed down the demand for PCR is the perceived lack of consistency, which can potentially damage the manufacturer’s equipment or affect their end product’s quality. However, technology advances have resolved this: “The testing equipment has come a long way, to the point where you can have a very reliable feedstock. The customer can trust that every single truckload of PCR that comes into their plant, which they are mixing with their virgin material, is consistent from one year to the next, from one load to the next. This is very important.”

“We have the technology to process plastics efficiently and produce consistently high-quality PCR that can be used to make new products – not necessarily consumer-facing or food grade, but products that have a valuable place in the market. Manufacturers recognize there is a problem and want to do something about it. As their awareness of these possibilities grows, the demand for PCR will increase, driving the development of a plastics circular economy,” concludes Enrico Siewert.

<a href="https://www.w-stadler.de/us/index.php" target="_blank">www.w-stadler.de</a>

STADLER Anlagenbau GmbH  

https://www.w-stadler.de

For a functioning circular economy, plastics must not only be extracted from post-consumer waste streams, but the recyclates obtained must also be of consistent quality

2021-04-07 Fachartikel Stadler Anlagenbau

Stadler Anlagenbau GmbH is dedicated to the planning, production and assembly of sorting systems and components for the waste disposal and recycling industry world-wide. Its team of over 450 qualified employees offers a tailor-made full service, from conceptual design to planning, production, modernisation, optimisation, assembly, start-up, conversions, disassembly, maintenance and servicing of components to complete recycling and sorting systems. Its product range includes ballistic separators, transport conveyor belts, screening drums and label removers. The company is also able to provide steel structures and electrical switch cabinets for the plants it installs.

According to Enrico Siewert, head of product and market development at Stadler, the key to plastics recycling is both maximizing the quantities recovered and ensuring the post-consumer recyclate (PCR) is of consistently high quality

For a long time, the many different starting materials in the waste led to inconsistent PCR quality. However, technological developments now offer reliable solutions to this problem

As the quality of post-consumer recyclate continues to improve, more and more applications are emerging that are based on these recyclates and are gaining a steadily increasing foothold in the marketplace

One possible product made from PCR are railroad ties. Compared to wooden ties, they are longer lasting and insensitive to water or insect infestation

Another possible product made from PCR are transport pallets. The properties of the plastic variant are better than those of wooden pallets and the material can be reintroduced into the material cycle after use or in the event of defects

KU-Verarbeitungsmaschinen allgemein

Kunststoffverarbeitungsmaschinen

issue 03/2022

issue 02/2022

issue 01/2022

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