There’s significant value to
be found from auto shredder
residue (ASR), if a new plastics
recycling operation in Fond
du Lac, Wisconsin proves to
be the model for profitable
recovery. And, it appears
this venture has the partners
and the technology to make
it happen. EnviroPlastics
Group, a subsidiary of Plastics
Conversion Technologies headquartered
in Spokane, Washington and
Plas2Fuel Corporation, based
in Kelso, Washington are teaming
up to merge dedicated ASR
sorting and cleaning with
a chemical process that recycles
plastics not suitable for
resin markets into synthetic
crude oil.
Raw ASR or shredder “fluff”
presents growing problems
for landfills because it contains
contaminants at a time when
environmental regulations
are getting tighter. The prime
concerns are metals like lead,
copper, zinc and cadmium,
petroleum hydrocarbons, volatile
and semi-volatile organic
compounds.
California, for example, has
pending legislation (SB 524)
to establish an auto shredder
residue working group by February,
2010 to review and evaluate
the practice of using ASR
as alternative daily landfill
cover to determine if it poses
a threat to human health and
the environment. Meanwhile,
Rick Brasch, legislative director
of the California Department
of Toxic Substances told us,
“Since the 1980s ASR has been
permitted for alternative
daily cover, but now we are
reevaluating the constituents
of ASR to determine if the
current operating conditions
adequately protect public
health and environment.” Brasch
went on to say that his department
wants to work with the industry
to see how to best control
the risks and whether the
current operating conditions
do that or not.”
Yet, ASR consists of potentially
valuable commodities – primarily
plastics and non-ferrous metals.
If these materials can be
liberated into clean commodity
streams for the resin and
non-ferrous markets, and if
the leftover plastics can
be converted into fuels, it
could be a successful model
to profitably recycle ASR
and help solve landfill problems.
The partners in the Fond du
Lac project envision a network
of scalable ASR recycling
plants close to auto shredding
operations to access feedstock
and minimize transportation
costs. If successful, these
plants could save shredders
on trucking costs and tipping
fees and create a boom in
ASR recycling.
No one seems to have an accurate
measure of ASR volume generated
by roughly 250 United States
auto shredding operations.
“As far as we know there are
250 to 270 auto shredders
in the United States and a
total of about 650 to 700
worldwide,” said Rusty Manning,
director of new equipment
sales for Riverside Engineering,
an auto shredder manufacturer.
Industry experts agree that
the number of vehicles being
shredded today is dramatically
down due to the economy and
the drop in metal prices.
A study released in April by
the Paul Scherer Institute in
Switzerland calculated the composition
of ASR at 60 percent plastics,
15 percent minerals (glasses
and sand), 10 percent textiles,
leather and wood; 10 percent
paint dust and rust, and 5 percent
residual metals. If these figures
are correct, there is approximately
three million tons of plastic
feedstock annually waiting to
be monetized. Of course, ASR
composition varies from shredder
to shredder depending on the
types of vehicles ingested,
but with the right technology
ASR holds the promise of yielding
constant flows of non-ferrous
metals and plastics. Profitably
liberating these large potential
streams is the Holy Grail for
many entrepreneurs.
EnviroPlastics Group plans to
build large-scale, plastic recycling
operations near automotive shredder
locations nationwide, the first
being a 84,000 sq. ft. facility
in Fond du Lac’s Southwest Industrial
Park, on a 12.2 acre site. Now
in the design phase, the company
expects to break ground in October.
The site is close to one of
its strategic partners, Sadoff & Rudoy
Industries, which has an auto
shredder in Fond du Lac. Sadoff & Rudoy
is a major Midwest processor
of scrap metal with six operations
in Wisconsin and one in Nebraska.
In addition, EnviroPlastics
hopes to draw ASR feedstock
from others in the region since
their plants are designed to
handle 100,000 tons of ASR per
year. The plant will take raw
ASR as it comes out of the shredder.
It goes through ferrous and
non-ferrous separation and plastics
are resized into one-half inch
pieces. “On the conservative
side we will recover about 25
percent out of the ASR. From
that, approximately 40 percent
will go to oil production and
the balance to the resin market,”
said Gary De Laurentiis, founder
and COO of EnviroPlastics.
The Fond du Lac plant will house
both EnviroPlastics proprietary
sorting and cleaning technology
as well as the Plas2Fuels’ chemical
process that converts mixed
waste plastics into synthetic
crude oil and other petrochemical
products.
Plas2Fuel has proven the efficacy
of its technology at its demonstration
plant in Oregon that was recently
approved for full scale production
by the Oregon Department of
Environmental Quality. While
operating at 25 percent capacity
during the demo phase, the plant
produced 10,000 gallons of synthetic
crude oil per month from waste
agricultural plastics such as
nursery pots, barrels and silage
bags. This crude oil is sold
to a nearby refinery where it
is made into ultra low sulfur
diesel, gasoline, jet fuel and
other petrochemicals. “We looked
at three different chemical
processes, but Plas2Fuel was
the only one that had a plant
up and running and is actually
selling oil,” said De Laurentiis.
“Most oil coming out of the
ground contains sediment and
water, so perhaps only 87 percent
of the barrel is useable for
high value products, the rest
is sludge,” said Brent Bostwick,
Plas2Fuels’ vice president of
business development. “Our product
has virtually zero sludge or
sulfur, so the entire barrel
is useable for high value products.”
Now that Plas2Fuel is reaching
full capacity in Oregon, Bostwick
stated that when all costs of
manufacturing are accounted,
the company produces synthetic
crude from mixed plastics for
$42 a barrel. With crude oil
prices approaching $70 a barrel
and predicted to go higher,
that is an extremely healthy
profit outlook.
Plas2Fuel’s chemistry would
not be practical for ASR without
EnviroPlastics’ proprietary
micro-segregation system and
their patent pending cleaning
process that was developed over
the past year at a pilot plant
in Pittsburgh. “The automated
separation component is not
rocket science, but the cleaning
component is critical,” De Laurentiis
emphasized. This technology
removes contaminants from plastics
using a single step process
that employs a combination of
two liquefied gases under pressure.
“As far as we know, we are the
first process that is actually
able to capture all of the contaminants
for proper disposal,” De Laurentiis
added.
Shredder residue is separated
into two streams, plastics and
waste. The mechanical separation
process was developed with EnviroPlastics’
strategic partner and shareholder,
Central Manufacturing. “The
separation technology exists.
We just had to be creative and
mix and match it to our needs,”
said De Laurentiis.
Once cleaned, the plastic is
separated into three streams
(PP/PE, ABS/HIPS and mixed plastics)
using ‘sink float’ technology.
The separated streams are sent
through a metal detector and
packaged for sale, or sent bulk
to make oil.
“Autos contain anywhere from
350 to 500 pounds of plastic
per car, so we had worked with
a large auto shredder in the
Pacific Northwest and found
that in its present form it
is too dirty and commingled
to extract an economically viable
hydrocarbon stream. While we
were searching for a way to
get at that plastic we became
acquainted with EnviroPlastics
and their technology. Their
technology is incredible – very
impressive,” said Bostwick.
“Our process is indiscriminate.
We take plastic types one through
seven (PETE, HDPE, V, LDPE,
PP, PS and other). We don’t
care if it is dirty,” said Bostwick
of Plas2Fuel.
Plas2Fuel’s process is relatively
simple. Forced air, heated by
a natural gas burner, is used
to indirectly heat the feedstock.
The material is isolated from
oxygen in a vacuum environment.
Through thermolysis and chromatography
various compounds found in mixed
waste plastics are separated.
Gases created during thermolysis
are sent back into the process
to minimize energy consumption
and are also used to heat storage
tanks and run an oil-water separation
process. The vessels are well
insulated to retain heat. The
process essentially “cracks”
the plastic into synthetic crude
oil.
“For every one BTU of energy
used in the process we yield
almost eight BTUs of energy,”
said Bostwick. Depending on
the composition of the feedstock,
it takes approximately eight
pounds of plastic to make one
gallon of synthetic crude.
Once the system is up to temperature
it runs 24/7 in what Plas2Fuel
calls a continuous batch process.
It is actually several vessels
running separate batches on
a staggered schedule so there
is continuous production. With
a four vessel configuration
at their Oregon plant, Plas2Fuel
can process 10 tons of waste
plastic per day. An interesting
aspect of this process is that
the individual vessel is relative
small and Plas2Fuel says that
the equipment is easy to operate
with minimum training. Because
of the small size, the number
of vessels can be scaled to
the volume of the feedstocks.
This may allow small plants
to be located at or near shredders,
thus avoiding transportation
costs.
“There are hundreds of millions
of pounds of ASR going to landfills
every year and it has to be
stopped. Finally, our technology
is able to handle virtually
any plastic feedstock,” said
Bostwick.
Liberating value from ASR is
a challenge, one that is being
addressed by a number of entrepreneurial
companies using various chemical
processes, low speed secondary
shredders for size reduction,
eddy current separation to recover
non-ferrous and mechanical processed
with finer granularity to separate
marketable commodities. Landfill
prohibitions appear to be on
the horizon and the shredding
industry is nervous.
“All the shredders are waiting
for us to build our first plant
to prove the concept. The ideal
situation is for us to site
this equipment right at the
shredder and continue to further
process the material. We can
help mitigate the pressure on
shredders from the legislative
side and reduce the volume going
to landfill,” said De Laurentiis.
