Plastics are simply chains of molecules linked together, these chains are called polymers. This is why many plastics begin with “poly,”- such as polyethylene, polystyrene, and polypropylene. Polymers are often made of carbon and hydrogen and sometimes oxygen, as well as nitrogen, sulfur, chlorine, fluorine, phosphorous, or silicon.
The term “plastics” encompasses all these various polymers.
By recycling, you can also help conserve the additional 80% of energy that's typically used when making new plastic bottles, containers and other items instead of recycling. It's easy to see why recycling plastic is so important. Baled plastics, specifically plastic bottles, have a high scrap value per ton.
Polyethylene Terephthalate PET
PET is a highly valued packaging material because it is strong yet lightweight, non-reactive, economical, and shatterproof. PET's safety for food, beverage, personal care, pharmaceutical and medical applications is recognized by health authorities around the world.
Flexible, translucent / waxy, weatherproof, good low temperature toughness (to -60'C), easy to process by most methods, low cost, good chemical resistance.
Low Density Polyethylene (LDPE) is a very flexible material with very unique flow properties that makes it particularly suitable to plastic film applications like shopping bags. LDPE has high ductility but low tensile strength which is evident in the real world by its propensity to stretch when strained.
Globally, around 80% of LLDPE goes into film applications such as food and non-food packaging, shrink/stretch film and non-packaging uses. The trend in food packaging films is towards high performance film structures that are less permeable to increase shelf life and enhance flavours.
PVC is a thermoplastic made of 57% chlorine (derived from industrial grade salt) and 43% carbon (derived predominantly from oil / gas via ethylene). It is less dependent than other polymers on crude oil or natural gas, which are non-renewable, and hence can be regarded as a natural resource saving plastic, in contrast to plastics such as PE, PP, PET and PS, which are totally dependent on oil or gas. This chlorine gives to PVC excellent fire resistance.
POLYPROPYLENE (PP) is a Polyolefin and a thermoplastic polymer used in a wide variety of applications including packaging and labeling, textiles (e.g., ropes, thermal underwear and carpets), stationery, plastic parts and reusable containers of various types, laboratory equipment, loudspeakers, automotive components, and polymer banknotes.
Polystyrene is easy to process, has a nice gloss and it is still the most preferred material for thermoforming. The most well known polystyrene application is yoghurt cups. There are 3 main categories of Polystyrene, namely GPPS (General Purpose Polystyrene), HIPS (High Impact Polystyrene), and EPS (Expanded Polystyrene).
Paper collected for recycling is sorted, graded and taken to a paper mill. From here, pulp is created and then screened, cleaned and turned into new paper.
