Three major North American resin makers have created a fund that invites businesses across the plastics value chain to join in advancing the recovery and recycling of polyolefins in the US and Canada, according to American investment firm Closed Loop Partners (New York, New York; www.closedlooppartners.com), which will manage the fund.

US suppliers Dow (Midland, Michigan; www.dow.com) and LyondellBasell (LYB, Houston, Texas; www.lyondellBasell.com) and Canada’s Nova Chemicals (Calgary, Alberta; www.novachem.com) have contributed to the USD 25m (EUR 20.6m) Closed Loop Circular Plastics Fund, and the goal is to quadruple that initial stake and recycle more than 226,000 t of polyethylene and polypropylene over the lifespan of the investment vehicle. The fund plans to use a mix of debt and equity financing, and seeks to stimulate mainstream co-investments, including those from financial institutions, into circular solutions for plastics.

The fund manager said it will invest in three areas:

• Access – Increasing the collection of targeted PE and PP by advancing current and next-generation material collection systems, including transportation, logistics and recycling sortation technologies and infrastructure.
• Optimisation – Upgrading recycling systems to more efficiently aggregate, classify and sort the targeted materials to increase the total amount of high-quality plastic, including food-grade and medical-grade plastic, sent for remanufacturing.
• Manufacturing – Investing in facilities and equipment that manufacture finished products, packaging or related goods using recycled content, including recycled PE and PP.

With established facilities, extensive supply chain networks and markets, Dow, LyondellBasell and Nova Chemicals are collectively well-positioned to help advance the transition to a new, more circular system,” the fund manager said. It noted that increasing the recovery and recirculation of plastics could help meet an addressable market for plastics with potential revenue opportunities of nearly EUR 100 bn in the US and Canada alone.

Closed Loop Partners said that since its founding in 2014, its portfolio of more than 50 investments has diverted over 2m t of material from landfills and back into manufacturing supply chains.