PETpla.net Insider 05 / 2017

TRADE SHOW REVIEW PET planet Insider Vol. 18 No. 05/17 www.petpla.net 40 Plastics Recycling Show Europe, Amsterdam, NL 2017, part 1 Creating a sustainable recycling society by Heike Fischer The statement plastics recycling first by Ton Emans, President of Plastics Recyclers Europe was a striking, persuasive comment on the importance of the all-embracing Plastics Recycling Show Europe, held for the first time in Amsterdam, Netherlands in March 2017. PRS Europe 2017 featured over 80 exhibiting companies, heard more than 40 conference speakers giving imaginative and inspirational presen- tations and had a total footfall close to 1,400 over two days. Exhibitors and visitors attending the show were a good representation of the whole value chain of the plastics industry including among others: recyclers, machine producers, raw material pro- ducers, converters, waste manage- ment companies and brand owners. It resembled something of a family affair as Gerben-Jan Gerbrandy, member of Parliament (MEP) and committee member for the Environ- ment, Public Health and Food Safety opened the event at the RAI Amster- dam, where he urged the European Commission to take plastics recycling seriously in its Plastics Strategy report due to be published later this year. He also took the opportunity to call for action to increase the reuse and recy- cling of plastics. “We can show the world that it makes economic sense to recycle plastics, that it has a huge environmental benefit, but first of all it has huge economic benefits,” Ger- brandy said at PRS. The two-day conference program was divided into three parts: materi- als focus sessions, plastics recycling industry challenges and the plastic recycling process. The PET session was opened by Casper van den Dungen, Vice President and PET WG Chairman at Plastics Recyclers Europe. His ques- tion to the audience was: How can we develop PET recycling further in Europe? In his presentation, he pro- moted the mission of Plastics Recy- clers Europe: The important point is to create conditions which enable profit- able and sustainable business, and this, he stated, should be by initiating recycling projects to promote the use of recycled plastics. Additionally, he underlined the importance of offer- ing a service platform to inform the industry and their customers in detail. He showed the current status of use of virgin and rPET in different appli- cations: for sheets, preforms, addi- tives and machines. The use of virgin PET per year in different application he mentioned amounted to 3,000kt, whilst the use of rPET per year was 1,200kt. In the end, the collection rate of material from virgin PET is 1,700kt, and for rPET 50kt, which equates to a percentage of 57%. Den Dungen pointed out that the feedstock status for bottle collection is close to satura- tion based upon current infrastructure. The sheet and tray collection is still in the start phase and needs infra- structure adaption. The washing lines of bottle recycling plants were busy at 30%, with a capacity average of 20-25tk input. To meet the Commission’s new proposal that recycling volume should be doubled by 2025, den Dungen spoke of the need for a change in outlook. The circular economy, especially in PET recy- cling is an important component as is the deposit refund scheme also. He considered that there is and will be a volume growth of plastics use but profitable growth would be limited if there are no changes. For him the deposit refund scheme would be like motorway tolls. The major changes for him have to be an adaption of infrastructure to increase the collec- tion rate. He further suggested using as much collected PET as possible to program new business models to finance the higher targets. According to him the new recycling capacities need to be adapted to future col- lection facilities. To program future values, it is also good to know the history of the product which has to be recycled, he added. He concluded by saying that the successful past history of rPET is preparing for a transition for the next level. The lead- ing recycling rate of 52% will move up if higher targets for plastics are required. New deposit bottle and new tray, and non-food packaging collec- tions are new infrastructure develop- ments which can be expected at a level of more than 500kt. In his sum- mary, he stated that a high collection rate will result in higher cost but that these costs would be absorbed in the value chains. There is the need for new business models to secure investment as well as the absorption of this new volume in the market, he concluded. A number of PET experts then proffered their own views on new developments and projects in the PET recycling business. PET recycling competence (f.l.t.r.): Casper van den Dungen, Vice President, PET WG Chairman at PRS, Board Member of PRS Paolo Glerean and Olivier Vilcot, Vice President at SRP