Description of the Renew Process
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The Renew process is a unique patented process that consists of the following steps:
a) Flake Preparation - consisting of Grinding and a density based separation system for removal of gross contaminants.
b) Hot Glycol Wash – a pioneering unique treatment of waste with hot glycol to impart key properties to flake prior to Glycolysis.
c) Glycolysis, to enable complete depolymerisation to low viscosity dilute oligomer solution
d) Decolouration – A patented step to adsorb colour from coloured PET bottles (that have very low value today) into proprietary adsorbents and additives.
e) Filtration – A patented step to remove high levels of PVC, olefins, metal and other extraneous contaminants through a patented filtration process. The filter also removes the adsorbents used in the previous step for decoloration. The resultant product is a colourless oligomer with excellent properties. This oligomer can then be re-polymerised using a process identical to that used for polymerisation of oligomer made from virgin raw materials. |
The Process is unique in that it selectively removes the color and impurities from PET fractions thereby completely eliminating expensive and error prone manual sorting. The retention and complete reuse of the PET fraction from coloured PET bottles substantially improves the yield as when compared to a competing technology. In other technologies, no matter how advanced, coloured bottles are removed prior to flake preparation manually and realize very little value when disposed. Since the process supports the use of coloured bottles, availability of feedstock to support a high recycle regime is enhanced.
Comparative Performance of Renew and Incumbent Technologies
Energy Consumption per MT:
Specific consumption of the key energy and utility inputs for the Renew Process are given below:
These include inputs for conversion of PET Bottle flake to 1 MT of finished bottle resin.
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