TOKYO, Japan — October 19, 2021 — Teijin Frontier Co., Ltd., the Teijin Group’s fibers and products converting company, announced today that its core base for polyester fiber manufacturing, Teijin Polyester (Thailand) Limited (TPL), will launch a facility to convert used domestically-produced plastic bottles into recycled polyester chips for the production of high-quality polyester filament. The facility will start operating in January 2022 and is expected produce 7,000 tons of recycled polyester chips annually by fiscal 2025.
Teijin Frontier will install cleaning equipment and the latest repelletizing machine for removing foreign substances from the recycled PET bottles before they are molded into chips. TPL will use Teijin Frontier’s proprietary quality-control technologies in its comprehensive system for turning Thai plastic bottles into recycled polyester chips for the production of polyester filament. The raw yarn produced at TPL will be used in Teijin Frontier’s ECOPET® recycled filament yarn.
Products made with recycled materials have been growing in recent years due to increasing environmental awareness. In addition, the demand for recycled polyester filaments as well as staple polyester fibers has increased significantly. To date, Teijin Frontier has been procuring recycled raw materials to meet these growing demands. In the interim, the company has been seeking recycled-polyester raw material suppliers that could help the company both to eliminate high-impact long-distance transportation and to optimize its resource-cycling operations. Despite its best efforts, however, the company eventually determined that it would not be possible to secure stable, high-quality bottle flakes in the vicinity of Thailand, where Teijin Frontier’s main plants are located.
Teijin Frontier, guided by its THINK ECO® environmental initiative, is striving to improve its environmental value, including by developing environmentally friendly materials and products for applications ranging from clothing to industrial materials. Going forward, Teijin Frontier will continue to promote the recycling of used PET bottles in Thailand, where the company has been operating for more than 50 years, ultimately to help realize a more sustainable world.
Posted October 19, 2021
Source: Teijin Group