New green chemical plant in Ont
By PIC staff
Sustainability cleantech green chemicals GreenCentre Canada NexCycle Plastics Canada Inc plastics recycling solvents Stewardship Ontario Switchable Hydrophilicity Solvent Switchable SolutionsSwitchable Solutions solvent gives plastics new life
MISSISSAUGA, Ont.—A new green chemicals company called Switchable Solutions Inc. (SSI) is building a plastics recovery facility in Mississauga, Ont.
SSI designs and operates green chemical process technologies.
The company’s proprietary Switchable Hydrophilicity Solvent (SHS) system doesn’t use distillation, a typical and energy-intensive requirement in conventional solvent systems.
The technology was developed by Queen’s University chemistry professor Philip Jessop.
SSI expects to be fully operational in about a year. At that time, it will be able to recycle approximately two million kilograms of post-consumer plastic materials a year, according to Mark Badger, the company’s CEO and president.
Badger, who was president of the Canadian Plastics Industry Association before stepping down to form SSI, says they will later add another installment at the plant capable of handling an additional 10-million kg of post-consumer plastic annually.
The facility will be located at the current site of Fielding Chemical Technologies Inc., a chemical and refrigerant recovery company that founded SSI.
SSI’s other founding partners include NexCycle Plastics Canada Inc., a recycled plastics compounder and polymers distributor; GreenCentre Canada, a research centre for greener chemical products and manufacturing processes; and Stewardship Ontario, a non-profit organization that runs provincial recycling programs.
“Our company was launched in April, and already we have powerful slate of industry partners,” Badger says.
He adds they’re in the midst of recruiting new partners who could help commercialize the technology soon.
While SSI’s main focus will be on plastics recycling, it also plans to target the oil sands processing industry.
“We have the chemistry figured out and we’re currently in discussions with material handling process engineering experts from the oil sands industry. We plan to partner with them to fully develop the process,” Badger says.
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