ITPLAST Aprile 2024 | Page 49

MATERIALS AND APPLICATIONS
Post-consumer PET bottles arriving at the recycling plant
Corrado Dentis , CEO of Dentis Recycling Italy
Roberto Dentis , co-owner of Dentis Recycling
gency which put the entire industrial sector in serious difficulty , followed by a 2021 that , at least for us , was nothing short of extraordinary and certainly one of the three best years in our history ,” comments Corrado Dentis , CEO of Dentis Recycling Italy srl . “ 2022 was influenced by the high prices of energy and the shortage of raw materials in relation to the growing demand , thus causing prices to soar so that , today , mechanical recycling has to deal with a substantially stagnant demand . In addition , as we all know , there is an EU rule ( to be implemented from January 1 , 2025 ) to introduce 25 percent recycled PET in the production of PET containers for liquid food , together with a separate collection target of 77 percent in 2025 and 90 percent in 2029 .”
All this initially suggested that , given the trend in place two years before implementation , the demand should have held in 2023 . Instead , especially in our country , many customers decided to continue purchasing virgin resins pending the entry into force of the EU rule on recycled material . “ In the peak months of 2022 , i . e . May and June , post-consumer PET bottles were sold at EUR 1,700 per tonne , then the price fell to EUR 115 per tonne in August 2023 , so the current situation of the sector can be well understood , with European companies closing down and others temporarily laying off their employees . We are official suppliers of major bottled water and beverage companies with which we have signed contracts : in 2022 they asked to significantly increase
production volumes but today they are buying from us the minimum allowed under the terms of these contracts .”
INVESTING IN INNOVATION Dentis Recycling boasts a long-standing experience in the production of Petalo , a secondary raw material delivered in the form of flakes that is suitable for any type of application . A flagship of the company for decades on international markets , Petalo is produced in high-performance plants which , from their current production capacity , will pass to over 100 thousand tons per year within a couple of years . “ This is thanks to a strategy of sizeable investments in two new washing lines to deliver much more product , even in pellet format , having
Italian technology plast / April 2024
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