Pumping up the value of recycled plastics

Hewlett-Packard (NYSE: HPQ) and the LaVergne Group have developed a closed-loop recycling process that is already finding high-value uses for discarded plastics.

HP is currently using the process to produce new printer cartridges, but officials told the Cleantech Group that the material has potential applications in the internal components of computers and printers because of its improved characteristics over typical recycled plastic.

The finding is significant because recycled plastic is often destined for low-quality uses, said Dean Miller, the lead of HP’s Worldwide Inkjet Supplies Recycling Program.

“What’s far more typical is plastics are recovered and down-cycled to plastic benches or plastic lumber. You’ve found another use, but it’s one step removed from the landfill,” Miller told the Cleantech Group. “To up-cycle the water bottled is quite a breakthrough, and it’s the kind of application companies are going to have to find more of as natural resources become more constrained.”

HP gets the recycled plastic from its own printer cartridges, which are typically more than 70 percent polyethylene terephthalate (PET). Additionally, HP uses water bottles, one of the most commonly recycled plastics in the world.

When PET plastic is heated in the molding process, it typically loses about 20 percent to 30 percent of its structural properties. So HP and the LaVergne Group developed a way to mix additives in to bring the recycled products back up to the same level of performance. The material is used in existing molds and production lines to create new cartridges that contain 75 percent recycled content.

“The additives with each cycle essentially allows us to have infinite recovery loops,” Miller said. “We’ve tested seven to 10 cycles, and there’s been no degradation in performance.”

In 2007, HP used 5 million pounds of recycled plastic globally. In 2008, that increased to 12 million pounds, said Jean Gingras, the environmental marketing manager for HP’s North American Printing Supplies. The majority goes to cartridges, but HP sells some of the plastic to be used in auto parts or plastic trays.

The growing numbers aren’t lost on plastics suppliers, Miller said.

“It was hard for us to motivate plastics providers to provide us with recycled solutions,” he said. “But now, some of the biggest plastics names in the business are coming to us with recycled content. It’s that kind of behavior that will move an entire industry.”

The development comes at a time when recycling is providing less financial benefits.

The economic crisis has reduced the cost of petroleum, which then lowers the cost to produce new plastic (see Are government subsidies going to save recycling?).

And according to some reports, recycling paper and plastic consumes more energy and water than it saves (see Report calls recycling a waste of energy).

Still, investors are looking at recycling as a sector ripe for efficiency improvements, including those that eliminate the need for recycling altogether (see Biodegradable water bottle introduced and Investors inject new funds in recycling).

HP’s developments came out of its Nashville, Tenn., recycling facility but are being applied in manufacturing facilities in Puerto Rico, Idaho, Ireland and Asia for five cartridge types. HP is researching the use of the recycled plastic in internal components of computers and printers, such as gears, ribs and other structural elements.

HP has the exclusive license for the LaVergne Group additive, but LaVergne is working with other customers to recover materials to make plastics. The HP process is the largest scale and only closed-loop process for LaVergne, Miller said.

HP made 565 million inkjet cartridges with recycled content from 2005 to 2008, with 400 million of those using plastic from the closed-loop process.

The PET resin is relatively easy to obtain. HP has created a recycling program for its customers to return used cartridges at no cost. And water bottles are typically separated from municipal waste streams, making them inexpensive to obtain, Miller said.

Of the 11 billion pounds of PET used in the U.S. each year, about 6 billion goes to bottles. Virtually all the 1.4 billion pounds of PET collected for recycling annually comes from bottles (see The dirty little secret of plastic recycling).