Suez Deutschland, the German branch of waste management group Suez (Paris / France; www.suez-environnement.com), and ELM Recycling (Bissingen an der Teck / Germany; www.elm-recycling.de) have set up a joint venture with the aim of constructing a new recycling facility in Bruchsal / Germany. As of March 2020, the 50:50 JV named Xplastics will be processing packaging and commercial waste into polyethylene-polypropylene mixed fractions, rLDPE and waste-derived fuel with an output of 70,000 t/y. Together, the two companies are investing almost EUR 8m in the project.

“By working together, we can leverage valuable synergies for the circular economy,” says Eberhard Lebküchner, one of ELM Recycling’s managing directors. His company has been running a treatment plant for the production of waste-derived fuel in Bissingen since 1998. Xplastics will not only recycle input materials from commercial and industrial collections but also mixed plastics from the sorting plant for lightweight packaging that Suez has installed in Ölbronn around 30 km further north. In addition, the JV is to be certified as a final recipient facility for the material recycling of packaging waste from Germany’s “Dual System” waste disposal scheme. According to a spokesperson, the final product will then take the form of different fractions, including flakes.

In Thailand, Suez is also building a recycling plant – see Plasteurope.com of 12.06.2019. The facility is expected to be completed in 2020 and will process 30,000 t/y of PE film waste into secondary materials for plastics converters.