Mexico City — Alcamare International Recycling Group S de RL de CV says it has won approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to produce food-grade recycled polypropylene.
“Alcamare has received a letter of no objection (LNO) from the … FDA confirming the capability of Alcamare’s recycling process to produce recycled polypropylene that is suitable for food-contact applications,” the Mexican company told Plastics News by email July 24.
The recycled resin produced by Alcamare at a 1.1 million square foot processing plant in Comonfort, Guanajuato state, is intended for use in rigid articles such as beverage bottle caps, coffee and take-away food containers and microwaveable food containers, the company added.
The fourth generation, family-run business collects 375 million pounds of post-consumer plastics every year, of which 166 million pounds are reprocessed. Most of the material collected is PET, polyethylene and PP.
Rubén Valdéz, Alcamare’s industrial director, said the company had created “a brand new, state-of-the-art, mechanical recycling process” after nearly three years of “numerous tests and reconfiguration of the washing-extrusion and devolatilization lines.”
Two new extruder and devolatilization lines came on line on July 2, he said. Each can produce up to three tons an hour, which will add 79 million pounds to the firm’s annual output.
According to Valdéz, 30 percent of Alcamare´s production is sold in Mexico, 40 percent in the United States, and the remainder in Europe and South America.
Alcamare has 16 collection centers where it purchases post-consumer PP. It has developed a “comprehensive range of processes and procedures to validate and test” the feedstock to ensure it “meets the requirements of the LNO and delivers the quality that customers expect,” the company added.
In late 2021, Alcamare, which has its head office in Mexico City, signed a long-term agreement with petrochemicals company Braskem Idesa S.A.P.I. to cooperate in the development of recycled, food-grade resins.
Alcamare describes itself as Mexico’s largest recycler of paper and plastics. In 2020 it reported that its recycled food-grade PET produced in Comonfort had received FDA approval.
Valdéz said Alcalamare also has a LNO for recycled high density PE resin.
Source: sustainableplastics.com
