France – Eastman’s molecular recycling facility in Normandy, France, will receive up to 20,000 metric tons per year of PET household packaging waste from Interzero.
After completion, the French facility for Eastman will transform colored and opaque PET trash into clear and transparent rPET. The French molecular recycling factory that Eastman plans to build will be the largest such facility in the world. After it’s finished, the facility will recycle about 160,000 tons per year of spoiled polyester that was previously unrecyclable. The target year for the project’s completion is 2025.
To retain additional raw materials in the loop, chemical recycling is an essential supplement to mechanical recycling. The two organizations share a dedication to material circularity.
Difficult-to-recycle waste
Recyclable plastic waste that is currently only partially recovered thanks to Eastman’s polyester renewal technology is finally able to enter the circular economy. If it can’t be recycled mechanically or needs to be downcycled using current technology, this material is often burned.
Chemical recycling technique developed by Eastman disassembles this difficult-to-recycle waste into its molecular building blocks, and then reassembles them into first-quality material with no loss of performance.
