02/12/2022
August 2022
DIC Corporation announces collaboration for closed-loop recycling of polystyrene food trays
Japanese chemicals firm, DIC Corporation, has begun collaborating with Hiroshima-based manufacturer of food containers, FP Corporation (FPCO), to deploy the “world’s first dissolution and separation recycling technology” for polystyrene, the raw material used in plastic trays for food products, to facilitate the closed-loop recycling of these trays. The two companies are aiming for practical implementation in fiscal year 2023.
In November 2020, DIC and FPCO announced plans to collaborate in the practical implementation of a closed-loop recycling system for polystyrene that maximises the technologies, as well as the collection and recycling systems, of both companies. This initiative aims to realise the closed-loop recycling that uses chemical recycling technology to recycle polystyrene to styrene monomer.
FPCO promotes “tray-to-tray” recycling, collecting post-consumer foamed polystyrene food trays from approximately 10,000 collection bases at supermarkets and other locations across Japan, and then recycling them into new food trays. Foamed polystyrene food trays can be either white or coloured, depending on use. The used white trays that are discarded by households can be recycled into new food trays. However, because pulverising coloured foamed polystyrene trays yields black pellets which usage is limited due to its colour; and therefore, these trays are generally recycled into materials for clothes hangers and other household items.
To resolve this issue, DIC has developed a new dissolution and separation recycling technology specifically for coloured trays. This technology, which makes use of the technologies and polymer design capabilities DIC has cultivated as a manufacturer of inks to eliminate coloured elements from black pellets, will be adopted at polystyrene production facilities, enabling “tray-to tray” recycling of coloured foamed polystyrene food trays as of white trays.
“We are proceeding with industrial verification of this process at DIC’s Yokkaichi Plant. DIC and FPCO intend to launch recycling of collected post-consumer coloured foamed polystyrene food trays in fiscal year 2023, as well as to combine this technology with chemical recycling, which the companies are promoting simultaneously, to create a hybrid recycling process,” DIC said in a press note.
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