PETpla.net Insider 05 / 2017

TRADE SHOW REVIEW PET planet Insider Vol. 18 No. 05/17 www.petpla.net 42 Third “rPET & recycled plastics” conference in Moscow A sector in its infancy by Gabriele Kosmehl Part 2 On February 16 and 17, the “PET 2017” and “rPET and recycled plastics 2017” conferences, organised by Inventra, part of the Creon Group, took place in Moscow, Russia. During this annual meeting point of experts from the Russian PET industry, major trends and projects were the subject of lively discussion about the worldwide market and for the Russian market in particular. The latter is showing a promising development for PET (see PETplanet 04/2017) while there is still a lot to do as far as the recycling business is concerned. The “rPET and recycled plas- tics” topic day was introduced with a general worldwide market overview presented by Helen McGeough, PCI Wood Mackenzie . Defined as key drivers of the bottle recovery market are sustainability, waste management, in particular the lack of space for dis- posal in landfill, and economics. Asia is the worldwide market leader with a PET bottle collection rate of 55%. The reason for these high rates is the high demand for PET in the fibre industry that makes the collection of PET bottles into a lucrative source of income constitut- ing an independent line of business. In Western Europe, the region with the second highest collection rate (17%), legislation is the main driver behind the return rates. The motiva- tion for a market to move towards high return rates can vary dramatically. For example in South Africa, McGeough showed that industry initiatives can also be very successful. The end of the talk indicated that the key issues for Eastern Europe are the establishment of a collection system together with finding suitable motivation for the market to set the system in motion. Domestic process- ing capacities should be created alongside this. Eastern Europe cur- rently exports the majority of material it collects. As regards price trends, a rise in the prices of rPET has been seen worldwide in recent years, attributable primarily to the crude oil situation. As it is usually expected by consumers that recycled products must be cheaper than virgin material, a lower oil price and therefore a lower virgin PET price restricts further developments of the rPET market. This point was also confirmed for other plastic types by subsequent speaker Kaspars Fogelmanis, Chair- man of the Board at Nordic Plast . His talk illuminated in particular the sit- uation for plastic recycling generally in the Baltic region, whereby he indicated both the trend of recent years from landfill to collection and reprocessing and the current challenges facing the industry. Konstantin Rzaev, Chairman of the Board, Ecotechnologii, brought the issue of currency into play. The exchange rate of the weak rouble against the dollar had made it more difficult for recyclers to estab- lish themselves economically in the market. Recently however, the rouble has rallied significantly and in Febru- ary/March the rate was again 57RUB = 1US$. This trend is linked to the oil price, which has risen again after many months on the decline. PET collection rates are estimated to be stable at >160,000t for 2016. For 2017, Rzaev expects a cau- tiously optimistic scenario with further stabilisation of the rouble, growing PET bottle collection rates and a single digit growth rate in the demand for rPET. This is an increasing tendency, although with somewhat marginal numbers, which has also been recog- nised by Victor Kernitskiy, Presi- dent of Arpet . From a collection rate of 115,000t in 2015, he reckons on growth to 147,000t in 2016. Besides the price trend, he defines the nega- tive attitude of consumers to recycled materials to be the critical point. Lyubov Melanevskaya, Man- aging Director of RusPEK Asso- ciation , described how the recy- From left: Danil Polyakov, Polymetrix, Kaspars Fogelmanis, Nordic Plast, Nikolay Asatiani, Inventra and Helen McGeough, PCI Wood Mackenzie