Thai-based Indorama Ventures (IVL) has announced new investments in its PET recycling capacity in Europe. The company aims to recycle 10 billion post-consumer PET plastic bottles from across the continent per year by 2023 as part of its commitment, announced in 2019, to aim to recycle a minimum of 750,000 metric tons of rPET globally by 2025. At that time, IVL said it would be investing up to $1.5 billion to achieve this goal.
The new capacity to be added by IVL France and Poland will see over 1.7 billion additional post-consumer PET plastic bottles recycled, will support the efforts of UNESDA Soft Drinks Europe, whose members have committed to use recycled PET in their bottles, to meet the EU’s plastic collection and recycling targets.
IVL is building a completely new facility in Verdun France , whichwill be commissioned in Q4 2021 and expanding two recently acquired facilities in Bielsku-Białej and Łęczycy Poland. These provide the washed and shredded post-consumer bottles as PET flake feedstock to produce rPET resin that is suitable for food contact use.
It is an investment made possible because of our customers, said François Lagrue, Head of Operations – Europe, Indorama Ventures Recycling Group
“Their commitment to bottle-to-bottle recycling allows us to invest in the infrastructure Europe needs. These new and expanded recycling facilities will support our shared goal of closed-loop and sustainable packaging solutions.”
IVL’s new plant in Verdun along with recent acquisitions in Bielsku-Białej and Łęczycy will work with their existing PET flake production facilities in Europe. Verdun and IMP Polowat’s facilities in Poland were acquired in October 2020. The input tonnage processed is equivalent to 9.8 billion post-consumer bottles. PET is 100% recyclable and the most collected and recycled plastic packaging in Europe
“This investment is another proof point that circularity works in Europe. By delivering a closed-loop system we ensure that valuable secondary raw material is not wasted and we achieve a well-functioning EU market,” said Nicholas Hodac, Director General of UNESDA Soft Drinks Europe. In 2018, UNESDA agreed a series of ambitions to make its plastic packaging more sustainable. This included using a minimum of 25 percent recycled PET (rPET) content in bottles by 2025. As a result, investment in recycling has been stimulated and rolled out. Many UNESDA members – including Suntory, PepsiCo and Coca-Cola – have gone further and announced ambitious targets for even more recycled content in Europe’s favourite soft drink bottles.
Indorama Ventures operates recycling facilities in Mexico, USA, Brazil, Ireland, France, the Netherlands, Poland, Thailand and from 2021 in the Philippines. It is a global business firmly committed to developing technologies and processes that use post-consumer PET and polyester waste materials as feedstock for the future.