PETpla.net Insider 01+02 / 2018

MATERIALS / RECYCLING PET planet Insider Vol. 19 No. 01+02/18 www.petpla.net 11 PET recycling in Thailand by Kay Barton Recycling is still in its infancy in Thailand. Royal Interpack has made it its mission to recy- cle post-consumer PET bottles and to use the resulting materials in-house, as up to 50% of flakes for rPET food packaging using an FDA approved super clean sheet extrusion process. This is no easy task; not only is there the lack of the necessary infrastructure for the proper collection, sorting and processing of the plastic waste, there is also the lack of any genuine awareness of the importance of recycling and the value of resource recov- ery. Above all, there is an especially urgent need for action outside the major conurbations. Royal Interpack, one of the first recyclers of this size in Thailand, processes its products with turnkey recycling equipment from STF Germany. Royal Interpack Co., Ltd., June 21, 2017 We met: Mr Visanu Chawla, CEO Mr Marcel Rauser, Plant Manager Chonburi Province, located some 130km south-east of Bangkok, is where Royal Interpack is heaquar- tered and where we met to discuss the market situation and equipment with company CEO Visanu Chawla, and Plant Manager Marcel Rauser. The company began thermoform- ing and extrusion operations in 2010, and decided to build a recycling plant for PET bottles in 2012. The STF recycling line now in use was the first that had been designed with a label scraper, for the removal of full PVC sleeve labels. The focus on auto- mated and optical sorting of both bot- tles and flakes was still quite unusual in Asia, back then. “The turnkey, fully integrated recy- cling, extrusion and thermoforming plant represented a total investment of US$40 million”, says Mr Chawla. “Of course, given the current levels of awareness of recycling, it will take some time for the investment to pay off.” The plant’s capacity totals 1.8t/h of material process- ing. Inadequate local collection and avail- ability means that the dirty-looking bales of bottles are even more likely to be imported from over- seas than sourced in Thailand. Inside the recycling plant, the system works fully automatically; the facility needs a total of just 15 employ- ees, who alternate in shifts. After the removal of labels, sorting takes place in a two-stage process, according to foreign materials and colour, followed by another mandatory manual sorting process before the bottles are then grinded. The material is then conveyed through two hot-steam wash- ing stages before the PET and PP Tour Sponsors: Inside Royal Interpack: recycling equipment from STF The Editourmobil in front of Royal Inter- pack’s main entrance are separated via a separating tank and centrifuge. In the next stage, the material enters a cold wash, before moving to the flake sorter to remove any remaining foreign materials. www.royalinterpack.com