PetStar opens largest PET wash plant in Latin America
By Canadian Packaging Staff
Automation Sustainability Bottling AMUT COMI AMUT ECOTECH AMUT Group Coca-Cola Friction Washer PetStar recycled PET Flakes Solid-State Polycondensation systemAMUT installs its latest PET wash system in PETSTAR bottle-to-bottle recycling plant in Mexico.
Earlier this summer, the AMUT Group of Italy installed its latest PET (Polyethylene terephthalate) wash system—its second—to PetStar company, to double its capacity of recycling technology.
This line completes Phase 2 of PETSTAR, owned by Coca-Cola and other Mexican investors, and represents the largest bottle-to-bottle recycling plant in Latin America with an hourly net capacity of over 6,000 kilograms per hour, handling 1.5-billion PET bottles per year.
The AMUT PET bottles recycling system is designed to convert post-consumer PET bottles into flakes suitable to be processed by an SSP (Solid-State Polycondensation) system.
These flakes will have a high purity quality and are suitable for bottle-to-bottle application.
The plant has driven a change in Mexico’s waste management sector by converting the post-consumer bottles into usable and valuable manufacturing input.
The non-biodegradable nature of PET bottles has always caused a excessive waste disposal problem throughout Mexico but now they can have a second life. The consumption of virgin PET involved in bottle production is consequently reduced.
The AMUT system includes a bottle pre-washing, detection, grinding, washing, drying and a final flakes detection in one integrated system running a continuous process.
The AMUT patented washing systems provides the complete removal of impurity with a substantial saving of water and chemicals.
The patented Friction Washer, connected with a water-flow recirculation and filtering system, removes any type of polluting material from the PET flakes.
The AMUT system is a continuous process, not based on batches, where washing process, water temperature, friction level and resident time are automatically controlled and monitored.
The supplying of this plant is also part of a social responsibility program to eradicate child labor in Mexico, with a financial incentive to families that collect waste bottles – an incentive to hopefully send their children to school.
AMUT is an Italian company with 56 years of great experience in plastics extrusion and recycling field, with offices also in North America and Brazil, with its AMUT COMI division dedicated to the thermoforming industry and AMUT ECOTECH, which produces waste sorting and disposal equipment.
For company information, visit www.amut.it.
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