Baspar/Iranpolymer A pioneering recycling technology which promises the ability to recycle post-consumer plastic film has been recognised for its potential to increase the circularity of food packaging.
Plastic recycling consultancy Nextek has been awarded the IOM3’s Circular Economy Award for COtooCLEAN, a supercritical carbon dioxide (ScCO₂) cleaning process that cleans and decontaminates post-consumer polyolefin films to food-grade status.
Recycling plastic film is notoriously difficult to achieve. There is huge demand from consumers and brand owners for a technology which can be scaled to decontaminate post-consumer polyolefin films (LDPE, LLDPE, HDPE, PP) back into food-grade material.
The process was recognised among other innovations, with the criteria for the award calling for technologies that enable progress towards net zero.
Increasing the circularity of food-grade films, COtooCLEAN uses ScCO₂, a non-toxic, non-flammable and non-corrosive solvent that selectively removes contaminants through the use of co-solvents.
The process removes oils, inks, adhesives, labels and chemical contamination from post-consumer polyolefin films, while recycling the non-toxic solvent and separating the residues.
Partners for the COtooCLEAN project include:
- Viridor Ltd a recycling, resource and waste management company, which will be the collector and recycler of films and potential plant builder for the scale up.
- Consumer goods giants Unilever, which will support the project with testing and analysis to validate the resulting materials for consumer goods packaging applications.
- Allied Bakeries, one of the UK’s biggest bread makers, selling 1.6 billion loaves in the UK each year and 90% of these are packed in polyethylene. The firm will evaluate the resulting recycled material with the involvement of their packaging manufacturer and will supply films for de-inking and test recycled films for food-grade status.
- Packaging producer Amcor, which is focused on making packaging that is increasingly light-weighted, recyclable and reusable, and made using an increasing amount of recycled content.
- University of Nottingham, School of Chemistry (Professor Steve Howdle) will conduct the majority of the optimisation research in the early work packages which will lead to scale up.
- The Biocomposites Centre (BC) at Bangor University, which has invested in pilot-scale CO2 equipment, will focus on LCA and process optimisation.
- Suprex, a joint venture between Phytovation Ltd and Bangor University, which specialises in the development of applications of supercritical CO2, will take a lead in equipment design and safe operation and construction and assist in large scale trials of the post-consumer films.
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