In Toronto, as in other cities, multi-family residential recycling rates have been stubbornly lower than their single-family counterparts. As Canada’s largest city works to boost recycling rates, a local MRF operator is experimenting with recovering recyclables from multi-family garbage streams. Two presentations at WasteCon 2017 in September in Baltimore touched on the recycling environment in Toronto. One came from Jim...

A team of college students in the U.K. is developing a low-cost instrument to allow manual sorters to quickly recognize different resins. Four undergraduate chemistry and physics students at Imperial College London are working to re-think how near-infrared spectrometers are designed and constructed to bring down the cost as much as possible. "We came up with some ideas how to...

A scientific panel signed off on a slew of PET recycling technologies this year, determining they produce clean RPET that can be used in food and drink packaging. The Panel on Food Contact Materials, Enzymes, Flavourings and Processing Aids (CEF) signed off on technologies provided by Erema, Krones, Next Generation Group (NGR) and Starlinger. CEF is part of the European...

A chemicals company that makes a nylon-boosting additive says it's now developing a product to improve properties of recycled PET. Global chemicals manufacturer Vertellus produces the ZeMac copolymer, which boosts the relative viscosity of nylon. Doing so allows compounders to sell recycled-content pellets for higher-end applications. Prasad Taranekar, marketing manager for Vertellus, recently spoke with Plastics Recycling Update about the...

The European Union will invest millions of euros into advancing a microwave depolymerization technology for PET container scrap and polyester in discarded textiles. The project, called Depolymerization by Microwave Technology (DEMETO), recently kicked off at an event in Brussels. DEMETO's goal is to push a technology developed by gr3n, a Swiss company, to industrial scale. The technology uses microwaves in...

German company Neue Herbold has re-engineered a plastics pulverizer machine to increase throughput without using more energy. The company's ZM800, part of a line of pulverizers meant for fine grinding of plastics, now has a redesigned housing. The unit allows spinning material to more easily be conveyed to the outlet. "The material's angular momentum is used for the discharge, since...

With its integration of upstream shredding and separation systems and downstream refining processes, Colt Refining and Recycling is oriented toward maximizing e-scrap metals recovery. That could leave the operation vulnerable to an evolving end-of-life stream with less metal and falling commodities prices. However, Colt has displayed the ability to weather the storm, partly by leaning on the expertise of its...

Nearly 720 facilities worldwide are now certified to R2. As the electronics recycling standard approaches its 10-year birthday, E-Scrap News takes a look at the factors that have shaped the standard’s growth of late. After several years of significant gains in the number of large North American e-scrap companies joining the R2 network, more recently the standard has seen slower...

A recent write-up from a U.K. electronics trade group leader makes a cogent argument for why electronics engineers have a key role to play in ensuring devices are repairable and recyclable. Craig Melson, program manager with techUK, discussed emerging repairability and recyclability expectations facing the electronics industry in an article he penned for New Electronics, a U.K. trade publication for...

A study commissioned by Closed Loop Partners identifies strategies to enhance the PET bottle recycling system, allowing RPET to better compete with virgin plastic. The report, "Cleaning the rPET Stream: How we scale post-consumer recycled PET in the U.S.," was prepared by consulting and research firm Resource Recycling Systems (RRS) with input from the Association of Plastic Recyclers (APR) and...