$40 Million Non-Ferrous Slag Recycling Plant to be Built in Romania

SEATTLE (Scrap Monster): Greek-owned Sometra has announced that it will invest $40 million to build a non-ferrous slag processing and recycling plant in Romania. The new plant will be built on the site of the company’s existing non-ferrous metals plant in Copsa Mica, Central Romania. The construction of the plant is subject to necessary approvals including environmental permit.

According to company sources, the proposed investment will cover the installation costs of new new kilns, whose construction is expected to commence this year. The plant is expected to become fully operational by beginning of 2020. The plant will employ latest ecological recycling techniques and will transform landfill slag into two saleable products- Waelz zinc oxides and Waelz clinker. The plant will recycle the slag accumulated over the past seventy years. It will take approximately 13 years to completely process and recycle the accumulated slag, the company said.

Christos Efstathiadis, General Manager of Sometra Copsa Mica noted that the company had invested nearly $3 million in research and development. Following this, it had concluded that it is economically feasible to process slag waste into new products of high demand in domestic as well as overseas market. In future, the plant will serve as recycling service provider to other industrial facilities in the country.

The economic crisis that hit the entire Romanian industry in 2009 resulted in scaling down of operations by Sometra too, by putting an end to most polluting processes. The plant currently has only 25 employees. Upon becoming fully operational, the plant is expected to create additional 50 jobs in the region.

Sometra is owned by Mytilineos S.A, the largest industrial group in Greece which holds leading position in various sectors such as metallurgy, electric power and gas trading.