France-based chemicals company Arkema has announced it has signed up for the Reverplast project, which will look at introducing recycled materials into the manufacture of new thermoplastic materials for the automotive, boat building and wind power markets.
The company says it signed up for the project alongside Ségolène Royal, French Minister for the Environment, Energy and the Sea, Emmanuel Macron, Minister for the Economy, Industry and Digital Affairs, and a further four partners.
The four partners are: Canoe, an Aquitaine, France-based technology platform dedicated to advanced materials, Paprec, a plastics recycling specialist, Indra, leader in the recycling of end-of-life vehicles and Plastinov, a specialist in the processing of composite materials for the wind power market.
The Reverplast project aims to create in Europe an end-of-life PMMA recovery stream to obtain new acrylic plastics says Arkema. These will then be entered into the composition of thermoplastic composite materials, themselves recyclable, to serve markets such as wind power, boat building and automotive, replacing the thermoset plastics which cannot be recycled.
Nicolas de Warren, Arkema Vice President Corporate Relations said: “With the backing of the State, the commitment to green growth that we have signed up to today will help mobilise, within the Reverplast project, five players heavily engaged in the circular economy to create an actual double loop: recovering a fully recyclable polymer, PMMA or acrylic glass, in order to add it to the manufacture of composites which are themselves recyclable, in order to serve dynamic markets such as boat building and wind power, but also automotive where recyclability requirements at end of life are a growing criterion.”
Arkema reports annual sales of around €7.7bn, employs approximately 19,000 people worldwide and operates in nearly 50 countries.