Extrusion International 6-2022-USA

40 Extrusion International 6/2022 K 2022 Innovative Recycling Solutions Attract Visitors at K 2022 T he EREMA Group's review of K 2022 in Düsseldorf is positive all round. And that applies to the interest shown by visitors as well as to the number of plants sold. With all the group's companies together on one trade fair stand, the EREMA Group presented its entire range of products and services more comprehensively than ever before. Together with partners from the plastics industry, they made recycling and the circular economy a tangible experience for visitors to the Circonomic Centre. "Recycling and the circular economy have arrived one hundred percent in the plastics industry. This year's K showed that very clearly," says Manfred Hackl, CEO of EREMA Group GmbH. The decision to have all group com- panies exhibiting on the same stand proved to be a good one, because they were able to provide an excellent over- view of their wide-ranging machine portfolio and each of their innovations. There was no indication at the EREMA Group's stand or in the Circonomic Centre of the fact that K had fewer visitors overall this year than in 2019. The absolute trade fair highlights included the INTAREMA ® TVEplus ® DuaFil ® Compact double filtration machine, which EREMA presented for the first time, and the EcoGentle ® plasticising unit. Both extrusion innova- tions achieve effective benefits for the quality of melt, re - cycled pellets, and final product, and set the benchmark in terms of energy efficiency for their post consumer and PET recycling applications. "We have already received the first orders for these two technologies, which confirms that we are meeting customer needs very well," says Hackl. This also applies to the READYMAC recycling machine made to stock by UMAC, which is an impressive, quickly-available all-rounder for standard applications, as well as to the new ALPHA XS edge trim recycling machine for the inhouse re- cycling segment made by PLASMAC. UMAC and PLASMAC are both EREMA Group companies. Other trade fair début appearances included the bottle- to-bottle application for the production of food contact compliant rPET pellets and new sizes of VACUREMA ® tech- nology plants, enabling throughputs of up to six tonnes per hour. On the VACUNITE ® system – a combination of VACU - REMA ® Basic and VLean Solid State Polycondensation (SSP) – a larger series has also been added to the existing range. One of the new VACUNITE ® 2621T 2.000 plants was ordered by an rPET manufacturer at the show. It was not only the EREMA Group's trade fair stand that attracted visitors; the EREMA Circonomic Centre in the out- door area also proved to be extremely popular. Twice a day, a total of twelve plastics streams of different degrees of contamination and bulk density were recycled live using an INTAREMA ® TVEplus ® machine. These live demonstrations, as well as the exhibition of around 70 products made from recyclate, were very well attended. The aim of the recycling machine manufacturer in the Circonomic Centre, together with many well-known brand partners from the value chain, was to draw attention to what is technologically possible in terms of recycling and the Circular Economy, and in many cases has already been successfully imple- mented in commercial terms. That is because plastics with one hundred percent recycled pellet content can now be found in chil- dren's toys as well as in food packaging. "This really opened the eyes of many visi- tors, and will help us implement new circular economy projects even more quickly in future," says Manfred Hackl. EREMA Group GmbH www.erema.com The daily live recycling demonstrations and the exhibition with around 70 products made from recyclate attracted huge numbers of visitors to the EREMA Circonomc Centre at this year's K (Images: EREMA) One of EREMA's recycling extrusion innovations: INTAREMA ® TVEplus ® DuaFil ® Compact dual filtration machine