Canada-based polystyrene and ABS recycler Polystyvert announced it has secured over $16 million in a first tranche of series B funding.
The investment, led by Rotterdam-based Infinity Recycling, will contribute towards the construction of Polystyvert’s first commercial polystyrene solvent-based recycling plant in Montréal. The $30 million project was announced in June last year. At the time, Polystyvert expected to start construction of the 9,000 tonnes/year facility by autumn and start production by the end of 2024. The company now says the plant is expected to become operational in 2026.
"This announcement, in the current economical context, reflects the unwavering support of our investors in our team and our proven technology, which is not only economically viable but also represents the shortest recycling loop for this type of waste, greatly reducing its environmental footprint,” said Nathalie Morin, president and CEO of Polystyvert. “All the conditions for success are thus met to move forward with the next steps towards our first commercial plant in Montréal. This is a key step in the promotion of our technology, which will allow us to achieve our ambitious goals in order to break into strategic global markets and position ourselves as a key player in the circularity of styrenic plastics in collaboration with the industrial leaders of this value chain," she added.
The new plant will recycle highly contaminated polystyrene waste, which cannot currently be handled by other mechanical recycling technologies. Polystyvert uses a pair of solvents, initially cymene and later heptane, to separate the polystyrene from contaminants.
"It's a dissolution process,” Morin told Plastics News, a sister publication of Sustainable Plastics, in an interview last year. “We take the PS and the contaminates and add a solvent, an essential oil-based product. That solvent will only dissolve the polystyrene so that polystyrene becomes a liquid. Everything else stays solid," she explained.
"At the end, once all of the contaminants have been removed, we add another solvent, and that solvent will precipitate the polystyrene, so the polystyrene comes back to a solid phase. And then you are left with the solvent and a paste of polystyrene, which we can separate. We recycle the solvent and form pellets of polystyrene," Morin added.
Polystyvert has been operating a demonstration plant since 2018 that can produce 1,000 tons of recycled PS per year, mostly for customers to use in production trials.
The planned facility's annual capacity of 9,000 tons represents about 15% of all PS buried in Quebec landfills each year. Polystyvert's process also cuts greenhouse gas emissions by about 90% compared with virgin manufacturing, according to the company.