Advanced Recycling
This newly developed method, also known as chemical recycling, is a great way of making hard-to-recycle plastics reusable, returning waste to the value chain as high quality polymer with a lower carbon footprint than their virgin plastic counterparts.
Geavanceerde recycling is het proces waarbij polymeren worden afgebroken tot hun afzonderlijke componenten, ook wel monomeren genoemd. Zo wordt polystyreenafval bijvoorbeeld weer omgezet in styreen. Het monomeermengsel dat hieruit ontstaat, wordt vervolgens gezuiverd en opnieuw gepolymeriseerd tot een zeer zuiver polymeer van topkwaliteit.
Giving Waste a New Life
As with mechanical recycling, the process begins with collection of waste and transporting this to a chemical recycling facility. The waste will be prepared for advanced recycling by cleaning to remove any contaminants and then shredding into small pieces to make the process more efficient.
The polymer waste then undergoes one of several methods of treatment such as pyrolysis, gasification or depolymerisation. This breaks the polymer into smaller molecules which are then refined into building blocks for new materials.
The new building blocks produced by this process can be used to make bio-fuels, new chemicals for the chemical industry, and polymers.
As with bio-based polymers, mass balance is used to facilitate the used of chemically recycled feedstocks in existing plastics producing facilities, alongside fossil-based feedstocks. This allows the processes of advanced recycling to become well established and scaled to meet the customer demand.
Why choose an advanced recycled solution?
This method of recycling is capable of handling complex materials; recycling mixed and contaminated plastics that are difficult to process mechanically and would otherwise go to landfill or incineration.
Infinite recycling potential. Breaking plastics down to their original monomers facilitates repeated recycling without degradation in quality, therefore offering optimal resource efficiency for a circular economy.
De carbon footprint van gerecyclede kunststoffen kan worden verminderd in vergelijking met prime materialen. Naar verwachting zal dit in de loop der tijd nog verder verbeteren naarmate de productieprocessen efficiënter worden.
Advanced Recycled Polymer Brands
Our supply partners have invested massively to bring advanced recycled solutions to the market and these will be commercially available very soon. In the mean time, if you would like to find out more, please get in touch with our team so we can keep you updated on the progress.
