EPC Engineering Consulting (Alzenau / Germany; www.epc.com) and CreaCycle (Grevenbroich / Germany; www.creacycle.de) have a solution for recycling flame-retardant EPS foams containing HBCD. Based on the "CreaSolv" process developed at the Fraunhofer Institute for Process Engineering and Packaging (IVV, Freising / Germany; www.ivv.fraunhofer.de), the targeted EPS plastic is selectively removed from waste streams using a special solvent formulation. The fluid is then filtered and cleaned in several stages.

Any HBCD from this purification step is separated from the polystyrene. Only high-purity plastic remains, which is remade into granules that are odour-neutral and suitable for further processing. According to EPC, the technology is ready for use and can be integrated into existing recycling plants.