The plan could provide a much-needed impetus to India’s recycling industry. It would explore viability gap funding, repayable grants and low-cost capital.

Gujarat, which recycles about a fourth of the plastics waste of the country, is regarded as one of the most environment-friendly states in India. More than 10 percent of the plastic products in the state are recycled, according to a study by Recycle Trade India, a recycled-material exchange in Bangalore. Around 4.4 billion pounds of plastics are recycled annually in India; Gujarat alone recycles about 1.1 billion pounds of that amount.

Still, the country’s government is far from pro-plastic. For example, India’s biggest government-owned transport company, Indian Railways, plans to replace its plastic cups with ones made from bio-based and recycled material for catering purposes.

Despite such challenges, India’s plastics recycling industry appears to be upgrading itself, according to many companies that exhibited at Plastasia, held Feb. 22-25 in Bangalore.

“Plastic recycling is growing in India and the market is huge,” said Bhavik Mehta, senior marketing executive at Leevams Inc. The Vadodara-based company represents many European recycling equipment companies in India including Erema, Neue Herbold, Kongskilde and Weima.

“We have grown around 30 percent each year from the last five years and hope to grow 40 percent this year,” Mehta added.

“We will soon be making pulverizers,” said Mehta, adding that the firm plans to license production of Weima shredders soon.

Jiaxing, China-based Zhejiang Boretech Co. Ltd. also is active in India. “We have supplied 34 PET [post-consumer] bottle recycling systems in India in last five years,” said company representative Alex Xiang.

Boretech supplied 70 recycling and washing lines up to 2012. The firm is now focusing on Africa also. “PET recycling is new to Africa and we are working on a number of projects in Tanzania, Sudan, Egypt and South Africa,” he said.

S+S Separation and Sorting Technology GmbH of Schönberg, Germany, also has a presence in India. Marketing & Sales Pvt. Ltd. aided S+S in setting up a Pune office for the service, installation and commissioning of S+S recycling equipment. M+V is part of German business development firm Maier + Vidorno GmbH of Cologne.

Luxus is targeting the European automotive interior trim market with the Hycolene product. The plastics recycler says the investment will increase the sales potential for its lightweight PP range and enable the European auto industry to increase its use of recycled-content polymers to satisfy both end-of-life (ELV) and increasing emissions targets.

Luxus will be collaborating on this project with the Stuttgart, Germany-based screw manufacturing firm Coperion to help with processing, tier 1 molding supplier IAC for materials trials and the auto manufacturer Jaguar Land Rover (JLR), which will provide end user guidance on the project to ensure the technical requirements are met, allowing exploitation of this technology in future auto applications across the industry.

By January 2015 the European auto industry is required to reuse and recycle 85 percent of the vehicle’s weight. Additionally, car companies are requiring suppliers to meet higher standards to improve the scratch resistance, provide greater stiffness and reduce the total weight of the car to improve efficiency.

Peter Atterby, Luxus’ managing director, says, “We’re pleased that the commercial potential of our Hycolene range has been recognized by the EU. This investment will enable us to effectively make a fundamental step change in our technology as we aim to replace our filled compounds with next generation reinforcing additives.”

Atterby continues, “These additives offer excellent tensile properties that don’t detract from the appearance of the molded compound, yet their adoption reduces weight by up to 12 percent per part and significantly improves scratch resistance to meet industry standards.”

He also says the new grades will offer a lower density than is currently provided, while still delivering up to 60 percent recycled PP. This means that tier 1 molding suppliers should be able to produce more parts per metric ton of the material, offsetting what is likely to be the slightly higher price for the grades.

A potential barrier for Luxus until now has been how to scale up its Hycolene grades using the existing infrastructure. Due to the grant money, Luxus has been able to purchase a new twin screw co-rotating extruder. This will enable the business to optimize the materials properties demanded for this project and at the same time ensure the expected tonnage is achieved.

At full capacity Luxus expects to gain a 2 percent share of the EU interior trim market by 2016.

Peter Atterby continues, “The success of this project isn’t down to just technology and expert knowledge alone. We believe that sustainable polymer technology has come of age, its performance is the same as virgin and therefore it should be priced the same—this is our message for Europe’s auto industry.”

Luxus also offers specialized closed loop and open loop recycling services to manage end-of-life post-industrial and consumer waste for the retail transit packaging, construction and local authority wheel bin markets.

Van de Greef says that by improving the structure of maintenance and providing training to operators who work the line, ARN’s PST plant succeeded in significantly increasing capacity at the facility in 2013. “We are now at the 38,000-metric ton mark. With that capacity, ARN can fulfil its obligation of recycling 95 percent of all ELVs,” van de Greef comments.

ARN says it is searching for investors to open a separate factory for the production of Crusca panels. Crusca panels, which can be used to shore up the banks of rivers, ditches and ponds, are one of the end products ARN is developing to consume the plastics extracted from ARN’s recycling plant.

“We have drawn up a bid book with our business case, on the basis of which PNO Consultants will approach individual entrepreneurs,” says van de Greef. “In that way, we hope to find a partner who is willing to take up the challenge of establishing the Crusca plant together with a group of investors.”

Van de Greef concludes, “We believe in our ability to sell kilometers of our material to this market, and we hope that in the future the panels will also be used for noise abatement screens.”

CFRP materials—both thermoplastic and thermoset—are created when thousands of carbon filament threads are bundled together before being combined with a matrix to form a composite material. A ply or layer is made to the specified size and orientation, and then more layers are added until the piece has the necessary properties to support the loads it will carry. The resulting material is composed of approximately 60 percent fibers and 40 percent resin, Airbus says.

Jean-Florent Lamèthe, an engineer from Airbus’ Materials and Processes team, explains that thermoplastic CFRP has excellent fatigue and damage tolerance properties, along with shorter manufacturing cycles and lower moisture absorption. It can even be welded, though thermoset CFRP cannot.

The key difference between thermoplastic and thermoset CFRP, according to Lamèthe, is what happens during their individual curing processes. “When you put ‘raw’ thermoset material into an autoclave and ‘cook’ it, there’s a chemical reaction—the actual chemical composition of the material changes,” he says. “With thermoplastic composites, you can melt a finished piece and reshape it and it still has the same chemical composition.”

Gael Sarrieu, also of the company’s Materials and Processes team, adds, “This difference makes thermoplastic composites very attractive. Why? Because Airbus and its suppliers produce literally hundreds of tonnes of scrap thermoplastic composites each year.”

He continues, “With thermoset, you would need to burn the resin, and all you end up with are the fibers—the remaining 40 percent (the resin) is lost. But with thermoplastic composites, the scrap produces the same amount of recycled material, which could be used in a variety of structural and interior applications.”

Unlike thermoset CFRP, thermoplastic composites also do not require curing in an autoclave and can be stored at ambient temperature without need of a freezer and humidity- and temperature-controlled room, significantly reducing energy costs, Airbus says.

Thermoset composites have become more prevalent in the air transport sector over the years because it is perceived—sometimes incorrectly, according to Sarrieu—to be less expensive.

“There are many suppliers of thermoset, so that drove down the cost. But now, there are more and more thermoplastic composites manufacturers entering the market, so prices are coming down,” Sarrieu says. “Still, even before the A350 XWB, Airbus had more than 1,500 reference parts made from thermoplastic composites and its use will continue to grow.”