Hilex Poly to Double Recycling Capacity at Indiana Plant
Hartsville, S.C-based Hilex Poly, a manufacturer of plastic bag and film products, has announced that it plans to double recycling capacity at its North Vernon, Ind., plant. When the project is complete, the company will be able to recycle 100 million pounds of material annually across its facilities, according to the company’s public relations representative.
Hilex launched the Bag-2-Bag closed-loop recycling program in 2004. Today, Helix Poly has 30,000 recycling bins in grocery stores across the U.S. In partnership with retail and grocery stores, Hilex provides an avenue for consumers to return used plastic bags and other household film for recycling through at-store collection bins. Using reverse distribution, the collected material is transported back to distribution centers for baling before being shipped back to the company’s Indiana plant for processing.
"As Hilex focuses on developing products that utilize more recycled content, we ask the public to continue to reuse their free plastic bags, recycle those that are not reused and support retailers that use recycled content bags—a proven enhanced alternative to recycled paper and virgin plastic bags," says Stan Bikulege, CEO of Hilex Poly.
Bikulege says the company’s expansion plans will move Hilex Poly closer to its voluntary initiative to manufacture plastic bags with 40 percent recycled content.
"The expansion of the recycling facility is a direct result of the tremendous growth of plastic bags and wraps being returned to participating retailers for recycling," says Mark Daniels, vice president of marketing and environmental affairs at Hilex Poly.
More information on Hilex Poly is available at www.hilexpoly.com.
Liberty Tire Acquires Able Tire Co.
Pittsburgh-based Liberty Tire, one of the largest tire recycling companies in the country, has acquired Able Tire Co., based in Texas. The deal will merge the companies’ scrap tire markets in Texas and Oklahoma.
Able Tire, which has been in operation for more than 16 years, has worked with tire retailers to dispatch, collect and track the disposal of scrap tires.
With the acquisition, Liberty Tire says it will take advantage of significant savings and efficiencies while retaining the company’s leadership team. Able Tire has established a paperless manifest system, a cradle-to-grave tire tracking system that includes the filing of paperless records with the Texas state environmental authorities.
Liberty estimates it handles close to 25 percent of the country’s annual scrap tire production through a network of 14 facilities, producing finely ground crumb rubber, rubber nuggets, tire-derived fuel and lightweight aggregate.
PWP Holds Official Grand Opening at West Virginia Plant
The plastics recycling company PWP Industries has officially opened its new 80,000-square-foot in-house plastics recycling facility in Davisville, W.Va.
PWP is working with Coca-Cola Recycling LLC of Atlanta to convert post-consumer PET plastic bottles into Food and Drug Administration-compliant resin for food-grade-suitable material. The new recycling center, one of the first for a thermoforming company, is estimated to have an annual capacity to recycle 40 million pounds of recycled PET flake.
Coca-Cola Recycling will be the primary supplier of recycled PET flake that PWP will use as FDA-compliant resin for the production of food packaging. PWP is a subsidiary of Coca-Cola Enterprises Inc.
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