Post –consumer rigid plastics recycling surged higher by 27% in 2014

ALBANY (Scrap Monster): The latest report released by the American Chemistry Council (ACC) indicates that the recovery rates of post-consumer rigid plastics rose significantly during 2014. The ‘National Postconsumer Plastics Non-Bottle Rigid Plastic Recycling Report’ was released during the Plastics Recycling Conference-2016 recently held in New Orleans.

According to the report compiled by Moore Recycling Associates, recycling of post-consumer rigid plastics touched new record high in 2014, increasing by nearly 27% when compared with the previous year. The recycling total exceeded 1.284 billion pounds during the year, almost four times the volume of recycled rigid plastics reported in 2007. Nearly 64% of the 1.284 billion pounds was reclaimed in the US or Canada, while the remaining was exported, mainly to China.

The domestic demand for mixed resin rigid bales remained high during 2014. However, 60% of the mixed resin rigid bales were exported during the year. The rise in exports is mainly attributed to rebound in exports to China following the tight green fence rules in 2013.

"We’re pleased to see growth in these important areas of plastics recycling,” says Patty Moore, president of Moore Recycling. “Continued expansion of a healthy sorting and processing infrastructure and further development of end markets for recycled materials are essential for building on recent gains.”

In a separate report, ACC also stated that post consumer plastic film recycling jumped higher by 3% in 2014 over the previous year to over 1.17 billion pounds. The report titled “2014 National Postconsumer Plastic Bag and Film Recycling Report” notes that plastic film recycling has surged higher by 79% since 2005. The US EPA figures indicate that recycling rate for film has grown from 6.6% of production in 2005 to 17% of production in 2014.

Based on survey responses, there is over 1.030 billion pounds per annum of non-bottle rigid plastic reclamation capacity in the US, as of 2014. Most of the US reclamation capacity is for PE and PP items.