NEWS Polykemi starts up first US plant
Swedish compounder Polykemi has started production at its new plant at Gastonia in North Carolina, its first compounding operation in the US. The company has invested around €18m in the new facility, its largest ever single investment, which will employ around 20 employees in the first year. The plant has an initial production capacity of around 6,500 tonnes and is equipped with two twin-screw com- pounding lines — 75mm and 92 mm variants. Polykemi has been supplying the US
market from Sweden and via toll partners for 10 years. “This lays the foundation for Polykemi Group to grow further on the North American conti- nent and it is great that the time has come to really start up the operations,”
IN BRIEF...
Braskem has increased capacity of its sugar cane ethanol-based Green PE plant at Triunfo in Brazil by 30% to 260,000 tonnes. It also said it has signed an MoU with SCG Chemical that could see construction of a new green ethylene plant with up to 200,000 tonnes capacity in Thailand.
www.braskem.com.br
US compounding machin- ery to battery separator maker Entek is to invest $1.5bn at Terra Haute in Indiana to manufacture Li-ion separators for EV batteries. It aims to be able to supply separator materials for up to 1.6m EVs by 2027, eventually rising to 3.5m. The company will use biaxial extrusion lines from Germany’s Brückner.
www.entek.com
www.compoundingworld.com Above: Polykemi’s new plant in North Carolina is its first in the US
said Johan Hugoson, CEO of Polyke- mi’s US subsidiary. The opening of the Gastonia plant gives the company four production plants on three continents: its head- quarters operation at Ystad in Sweden; the new US facility at Gastonia; and two production units in China located
at Kunshan and Chongqing. “We guarantee customers the same high quality of customised plastic compounds based on both virgin and recycled plastic raw materials deliv- ered from all of our global factories,” said Hugoson. �
www.polykemi.com
CA Picard moves in to pelletising
German machine compo- nents group CA Picard has expanded its plastics industry presence with the acquisition of Uwe Stücke Granuliertechnik, a manu- facturer of die plates and knives/knife holders for underwater pelletisers based at Bönen. “The aim of this transac- tion is to extend our
portfolio concerning extruders, to integrate the products of USG GmbH in our worldwide distribution and to offer our customers an extended service. In addition, we will provide USG GmbH with technologi- cal support,” said Jörg Vogel, VP Sales in CA Picard’s Extruder Technol- ogy division.
CA Picard’s Extruder
Technology division manufactures screw elements, barrels and shafts for a wide range of twin screw compounding machines. It also produces single screw extruder components for food applications. �
www.capicard.de/en �
www.usg-gmbh.de
French solution for flexible film waste
TotalEnergies and recycling group Paprec have signed a long-term agreement to develop a value chain for chemical recycling of plastic film in France. Under the agreement,
Citeo, the main organisation in charge of end-of-life household packaging in France, will provide a stream of flexible PCR plastic waste
to Paprec’s plant at Amiens, where a sorting and prepa- ration line will be built. TotalEnergies will use Paprec’s output in its chemical recycling plant at Grandpuits, which is currently under construction. “This long-term agree- ment is a major milestone for our advanced recycling plant at Grandpuits as it
guarantees a supply of waste of French-origin,” said Valérie Goff, Senior Vice President Renewable Fuels & Chemicals at TotalEnergies. The Grandpuit chemical
recycling plant is designed to process 13,600 tonnes/yr of waste plastic and is scheduled to begin opera- tion in 2024. �
https://totalenergies.com
April 2023 | COMPOUNDING WORLD 5
IMAGE: POLYKEMI
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