Dow chemical announced a breakthrough in plastic recycling
Dow chemical announced a breakthrough in plastic recycling
Dow chemical announced a breakthrough in plastic recycling
Material giant dow chemical has made a major breakthrough and decoded the password for recycling multilayer composite packaging bags.
The new technology, called "RecycleReady", is designed for a particular packaging bag. But Lamy Chopin, the global head of packaging and specialty plastics for dow chemical, predicts that this will lead to a new trend in the recycling of composite plastic bags.
With the use of recycled cleready, dow chemical adopts the compatibility of Retain brand, so that polyethylene (PE) and vinyl alcohol copolymer (EVOH) can be regenerated at the same time to generate a useful return film.
In the plastic PE and EVOH is very common, but for recycling companies have a headache, because EVOH isolation layer sandwiched between the PE layer, the reprocessing will stick to, lead to regeneration of PE film generated on the holes.
"It was a big deal, and it changed the rules of the game as never before. We can recycle everything together, we have both the advantages of the isolation layer, and we can recycle it. It's great. This is good news for many people in the value chain." Stacy Fields, director of the north American packaging and special plastic packaging solutions for dow chemical.
"For the plastic manufacturers, we give them a choice to meet sustainability requirements and to meet the needs of brands or retailers," Fields said. For recycling enterprises, they no longer need to do special treatment, they can recycle directly."
"This technology gives customers the option to participate in the recycling process," he said on global packaging bag BBS.
Dow chemical was originally developed to help the industry to regenerate PE and EVOH films, making EVOH compatible with PE in recycling.
Chopin said: "when we started working on the recycling cleready project, we realized that we could combine the Retain directly with the recyclable film instead of adding it after it was completed. This allows us to design fully recyclable membranes that are both isolated and characterized by EVOH. The recycling industry does not have to worry about EVOH pollution.
The United States sustainable packaging union and the plastics recycling industry have all endorsed dow chemical's technology.
Users of the technology of recycling cleready can display the league's How2Recycle label on the package, and consumers will know that the packaging can be put into the recycling bin.
"The recycling industry doesn't have to worry about it now, because it's already compatible with polyethylene, especially waste plastic bags from retail outlets," Chopin said.
"We think this is an important first step, and we will continue to move forward, and we have established the concept and cooperation process," he said. We also plan to bring new compatibilities to other materials such as polypropylene, which can enhance the performance of the packaging bags and complete the recycling process smoothly."
The packaging industry has been trying to solve the problem of the final treatment of composite plastic bags. Because of the complex design, sometimes the metal layers are included, and many composite bags are discarded directly. Dow chemical hopes to change that by using a "RecycleReady".
