PET giant Indorama Ventures (IVL, Bangkok; www.indoramaventures.com) has announced the official opening of its PETValue bottle-to-bottle recycling plant in the Philippines in partnership with Coca-Cola Beverages Philippines (CCBPI, Taguig), a bottling and distribution arm of Coca-Cola (Atlanta, Georgia; www.coca-cola.com).

The plant was originally planned for a 2021 start-up (see Plasteurope.com of 16.03.2020) with an investment of PHP 1 bn (EUR 17 mn). Pandemic-related issues, however, kept IVL from staying on the timeline track. “Some of our construction timelines were impacted by Covid-19 restrictions put in place by the Philippines government. During the periods when restrictions had eased and the government allowed some sectors to operate at a limited capacity, construction continued within the set parameters. Construction completed in Q4 2021, and PETValue was made operational by Q1 2022,” an IVL spokesperson told Plasteurope.com.

The delay also more than doubled the financial investment planned for the project: “PETValue Philippines is a PHP 2.28 bn multi-phased project,” the spokesperson added. The PET bottle-to-bottle reclaim plant has a capacity of 30,000 t/y, or almost 2 bn plastic bottles, an output of 16,000 t/y of recycled resin, and is to create 200 new jobs.

Located in General Trias in Cavite Province south of Manila, the plant is said to be country’s first food-grade operation and the largest reclaim facility in the Philippines. IVL also said it is investing USD 1.5 bn (EUR 1.4 bn) globally to expand recycling facilities and sustainable production, including a new ambition to reach post-consumer PET bale input of 1.5 mn t/y by 2030.

Yash Lohia, chairman of the ESG council at IVL, said, “By the end of this year we will have increased our recycling capacity to more than 375,000 t. In 2021, we acquired a PET recycling plant in Texas (see Plasteurope.com of 10.06.2021) and announced plans to build a new facility in Indonesia. In 2020, we signed a joint venture agreement with Coca-Cola to build a state-of-the-art recycling plant in the Philippines, which culminated in today’s announcement. In the same year, we also acquired recycling plants in Brazil and two in Poland (see Plasteurope.com of 15.06.2020 and 12.08.2020). This is to be celebrated given the challenging pandemic environment. These seven plants will join a family of existing recycling sites in Alabama, Ireland, two in France and the Netherlands.”