Nonmetallics

STUDY SEES SMALL PLASTICS DEMAND GAIN

A study conducted by a Cleveland area research firm projects a 3 percent average annual gain in demand for foamed plastics over the next five years. Reaction injection molded foams used in the auto industry will present the greatest growth market, according to the The Freedonia Group Inc. study.

The construction industry will remain the overall largest market for foamed plastics, according to the study, with applications in insulation, flooring, carpet padding and other areas providing opportunities for foamed plastics manufacturers.

PVC RECYCLING MARKETS LAGGING, FORUM TOLD

Attendees at last month’s World Vinyl Forum in Akron, Ohio, heard a lot about promising new products and markets, but they also heard some discouraging words from the recycling industry.

The Forum, sponsored by the Vinyl Institute, Morristown, N.J., attracted participants from more than 15 nations. Representatives from recycling organizations and private sector recycling companies asked those in the vinyl industry to pay more attention to the recycling record of polyvinyl chloride (PVC) – especially PVC packaging.

“PVC ranks dead last among the six resin types,” William Ferretti, executive director of the National Recycling Coalition, Alexandria, Va., reminded attendees. There is, he said, “an absence of any real market capacity for PVC ... especially for post-consumer PVC.”

Others from the recycling industry agreed. “We can’t find a home for it,” said Dennis Sabourin, vice president of post-consumer procurement and recycling industry affairs for the Packaging Products Group of Wellman, Inc., Shrewsbury, N.J. “Recyclers need a market for the PVC containers that they separate,” he said.

Wellman is a large processor of post-consumer polyethylene terephthalate (PET), for which PVC – which is similar in appearance but melts at a different temperature – is a significant contaminant. “It costs my company tens of thousands of dollars to get PVC out of the stream,” said Sabourin. “To us in this business, it’s a contaminant.”

Current market conditions favoring the use of virgin resins by manufacturers pose a threat to the overall plastics recycling industry, he added. “The plastics recycling infrastructure is in jeopardy,” Sabourin said. He pointed to the paper industry as one that has taken more responsibility for building a lasting infrastructure and remarked that recycling is “an accepted fact of doing business” in most other industry segments.

In closing, Ferretti hinted that if those profiting from the sale of PVC-based products did not make an attempt to change that situation, the current recycling figures are low enough to invite government scrutiny at some level.

ENSLEY CORP. BUYS SOUTHEASTERN INDUSTRIES

Ensley Corp., Canton, Ohio, has acquired Southeastern Industries, Reidsville, N.C., a recycled plastic processing and compounding firm. Dwight Ensley, president of Ensley Corp., says the company plans to “significantly increase production” at the Southeastern facility. As part of its strategic plan, Ensley Corp. also recently sold one of its glass processing facilities.

CLOROX BOTTLES WILL USE 25% RECYCLED PLASTICS

The familiar bleach bottles from Clorox, Oakland, Calif., now contain 25 percent recycled plastic. Owens-Brockway of Toledo, Ohio, is producing a bottle for Clorox that blends virgin plastic with recycled high-density polyethylene (HDPE).

Clorox’s phasing in of bottles that use recycled plastic throughout its product line has made the company a consumer of more than 30 million pounds of recycled plastic annually.

K MART, WEYERHAEUSER HIT ONE BILLION POUNDS

K mart Corp., Troy, Mich., reached a milestone recently when it surpassed 500,000 tons (or one billion pounds) of old corrugated cardboard (OCC) boxes collected for recycling. The retailer’s used corrugated boxes are collected by Weyerhaeuser Co., Federal Way, Wash., and processed to make more boxes. K mart and Weyerhaeuser began the recycling program in late 1993.

OCC MARKETS TURN DOWN IN FOURTH QUARTER

Last month witnessed a decline in the price of many paper stock grades. There are a number of reasons for the decrease: full inventories at mills, limited export markets, prices climbing too high through the summer, and an increased supply of material on the market.

But vendors do not expect to see any significant long-term price decline.