By Bruce Geiselman
With a focus on increasing its sustainability efforts, Polymer Resources has added new flame-retardant resins to its portfolio of high-quality engineering resins containing recycled content.
The company has long offered what it calls “utility grades” of resins containing post-industrial and post-consumer recycled material. However, increasingly, manufacturers want engineering resins with recycled content.
“The real change that happened over the last several years was a shift to wanting sustainable materials that still have to meet stringent specifications, have different agency certifications, meet properties required for applications, but also utilize 50 percent or greater either post-industrial or post-consumer feedstock,” says Scott Anderson, Polymer Resources president and chief operating officer.
In addition to the new flame-retardant resins, as of the beginning of this year, the company offered four general-purpose high-quality resin grades containing at least 50 percent recycled content.
It is pursuing UL 94 V-0 certification for the new fire-retardant materials. Some manufacturers and applications require the independent UL certification of flame retardancy, company officials say. The company hopes to obtain the certification in the third quarter of this year.
Polymer Resources is a major supplier of engineering resins to the electrical industry, which is leading the demand for flame-retardant resins with recycled content, says William Galla, vice president of sales. The demand is particularly strong for items like receptacle switches and junction boxes used in commercial and residential buildings. Manufacturers of residential and commercial lighting equipment also are looking for recycled material in resins with fire-retardant properties.
Another area of demand is from manufacturers of agricultural equipment and lawnmowers.
“I think a lot of it comes from governments and regulatory bodies that are pushing for landfill avoidance and sustainable solutions to really lengthen the lifetime of the plastic that’s being produced and used,” Galla says. “It really began in Europe first, and we saw tremendous strides being made there. As we saw Europe have some success with it, the American market then started to say this is something we need to do, we want to do, and we’re willing to pay for it.”
Using high-quality resins with at least 50 percent recycled content can result in higher costs in at least certain situations.
“On average, it’s going to be somewhat of a premium,” Galla says. “There can be instances where it can probably be cost-neutral at times. A lot of it is going to be application-dependent. Especially as you get into things that need custom colors and other aesthetics, with those feedstocks, you really have to take great care in sourcing them. There are more processes on the front end. It can be grinding, shredding, separation techniques. Those types of things all come into play, and that obviously adds cost versus just taking material and running it through a compounding line and pelletizing it. I would say there is a premium, but we do our best to control that.”
The company settled on a minimum of 50 percent recycled content in its sustainable resins for several reasons, including the need to produce plastics with properties similar to virgin materials. In addition, it would not be sustainable to produce plastics from 100 percent recycled material.
“It’s definitely to help balance the properties, but it’s also just from the market,” says Tim Farrell, director of technology. “There is not generally speaking a huge pull to have 100 percent recycle for most resins. The consumer is only asking for or demanding a certain percentage.”
Polymer Resources’ new grades of sustainable resins with fire-retardant properties are PC-FR(X)S – a polycarbonate (PC) resin, and PPX-FR(X)S, a polyphenylene ether resin. The x in the nomenclature indicates a digit from 1-9 which represents material flow rate. The lower numbers indicate lower flow and higher numbers represent higher flow. The products are commercially available and can be used for some applications while pending UL certification, according to the company. The company expects to release additional information once the resins obtain UL certification.
The four general-purpose engineering resins with a minimum of 50 percent recycled content are a low-flow PC resin (PC-GP1S), a medium-flow PC resin (PC-GP2S), a high-flow PC resin (PC-GP3S) and a PC/acrylonitrile-butadiene-styrene blend (PC/ABS-GP1S). All are opaque and available in natural, black or custom colors, according to the company. The properties and processing parameters of these grades are similar to those of their virgin counterparts, making it possible in many cases to use them as drop-in replacements for existing fossil-based resins.
Polymer Resources has established long-term agreements with producers of post-consumer and post-industrial recycled plastics, and inspects and tests all recycled content to optimize control over its feedstocks and ensure a reliable supply of material.
The company also recycles its own waste plastic for reuse in compounding operations. Its recently expanded facility in Rochester, N.Y., features a separate, sound-proofed 3,250-square-foot space for grinding and shredding waste plastic from customers, vendors and the company’s processes.
Contact:
Polymer Resources, Farmington, Connecticut, 800-243-5176, https://prlresins.com/
