
Iranpolymer/Baspar At NPE 2024, Ansonia, Conn.-based Farrel Pomini is betting on mechanical and chemical recycling applications for its continuous mixer technology.
The Farrel continuous mixer is a compounder that feeds to an extruder, based on the principle of two counter-rotating, non-intermeshing rotors, and a large free volume mixing chamber. First introduced in 1963, the machine is now adapting to market dynamics of increased demand for recycled plastics and biopolymers.
“We have high expectations for this fair,” Farrel Corp. President Paul Lloyd told Sustainable Plastics. “It’s the first NPE in six years, the North American market is very busy, so we expect our business and the show to be very active.”
Lloyd sees the fair as an excellent opportunity for ‘people to come together and exchange their ideas and see the latest technology, which has moved forward a great deal over the last few years’ in the US, particularly for recycled materials.
“Particularly compared to the European market, I think where [the requirement for recycled materials] is a little bit more mature, in the US it’s been gathering pace over the last two to three years,” Lyoid said.
A compounder for mechanical and chemical recycling
Farrel has made ‘significant’ changes to its compounder to adapt it for recycling applications.
“The machine was originally designed for feeding pellets around 3 mm of diameter that very easily fall into the machine. The recycling material we see is usually larger than that,” Lloyd explained.
The company put a lot of emphasis on developing the front end of the machine to face this challenge. Llyoid pointed to the large single-entry feed port to handle irregularly sized feedstocks and large amounts of additives and fillers; nonintermeshing, counter rotating rotors and a large free volume mixing chamber that can tolerate the often abrasive nature of recycled materials.
For mechanical recycling, irregularly shaped material is fed from a large hopper with crammer options for low bulk density feeding. Excellent temperature control is achieved, in part, by unique rotor geometry and process parameters like adjustable dams, orifice position, and rotor cooling.
For the chemical recycling process, the continuous mixer is used in the primary stage of the pyrolysis process to heat and melt plastic or rubber. Farrel partners with Texas-based Lummus technology for the chemical recycling of plastic, and with WF Recycle Tech in the UK for pyrolysis of end-of-life tires.
For plastics chemical recycling, the compounder effectively works as ‘pre compounder for further recycling’. The input is mostly film scrap, alongside some solid materials to adjust bulk density.
No special steps are needed to avoid contaminants, Lloyd said. The material goes through a general sorting, cleaning, and granulating process before it reaches the compounder, which ‘deals quite well with the occasional piece of debris, even the small amount of steel will not damage the machine’, Lloyd noted.
NPE launch
The continuous mixer for chemical recycling of plastics is being launched at NPE. It is now available for full commercialization around the world through technology licensing partnership with Lummus.
“We expect a high level of interest. We are hopeful to stimulate two or three projects from the show,” Lloyd revealed.
Sales for mechanical recycling applications are expected to be ‘significantly higher’, Lloyd said, with interest from both seasoned and new players in the industry.
sustainableplastics