Irish waste-management company Panda (Dublin; www.panda.ie), part of Beauparc Utilities (Dublin; www.beauparc.ie), has signed an agreement to construct a bottle-to-bottle plastic recycling facility in Portlaoise / Ireland. The company is currently collaborating with Trinity College Dublin (Dublin; www.tcd.ie) and Science Foundation Ireland (Dublin; www.sfi.ie) on the project, which is part of a circular-economy initiative for the European Green Deal (see Plasteurope.com of 27.01.2020).

The centre will be built at a cost of EUR 20m and is expected to create 100 new jobs. The facility, which will process up to 1 bn plastic water and soft-drink bottles per year, is projected to be operational by the end of 2021. According to Beauparc, some 20,000 t of plastic bottles used in Ireland are currently exported to the UK and Europe for processing. The plant in Portlaoise aims to cater to the Irish market’s requirements, thus eliminating the need to export. Panda is currently in negotiations with major soft-drinks manufacturers to collect, sort and process their material into new bottles.

To facilitate a closed-loop recycling process, the company plans to collect bottles with electric, zero-emission refuse-collection vehicles (eRCV), which were launched recently. Panda said it aims to make Dublin’s fleet fully electric by 2024, by replacing 30 vehicles currently in operation, which would result in a net reduction of 810 t of CO² every year.