German recycling company APK Aluminium und Kunststoffe AG is planning to set up five plastics recycling plants in Europe and South Asia by 2025.
The company made the announcement during the packaging show Interpack in Dusseldorf, Germany, held 4-10 May, but did not give further information regarding the size of the investment or locations of the plants.
The Leipzig, Germany-based recycler said the plants will be set up together with strategic partners and will aim to reduce global land pollution and marine litter.
APK said it had developed “a breakthrough technology that can be applied to a broad variety of plastic types and combinations commonly used in packaging, even difficult ones including multi-layer films.”
The technology exploits physical and chemical properties of different polymer types in order to separate these efficiently.
This, according to APK, results high-purity single-polymer streams.
“In Germany we have developed an advanced and economically interesting recycling technology to recover virgin-quality polymers from plastic-packaging waste…. We now want to expand in Europe while simultaneously bringing our technology to the region where the problem [of plastic waste] is acute: South-East Asia,” said CEO Klaus Wohnig.
APK, he added, was open to further cooperation with interested industry partners in order to change the plastics economy from linear to “truly circular” as soon as possible.