PureCycle partners with Gulfspan to recycle 1 billion pounds of plastic

Orlando, Florida-based PureCycle Technologies LLC, which uses solvent-based purification technology to recycle polypropylene (PP) scrap, has announced a partnership with Gulfspan Industrial LLC, a manufacturer based in Houston, to build and reserve construction space in Beaumont, Texas, for the fabrication of modular processing lines. 

According to a news release from PureCycle, Gulfspan's expanded capacity will help PureCycle's mission to grow its ability to recycle PP into an ultra-pure, sustainable plastic resin. This collaboration also will centralize and streamline PureCycle's module construction process, allowing the modules to be built and transported to sites internationally.

"Our partnership with Gulfspan sets another key foundational component for PureCycle to more efficiently implement and control our growth plan," says Dustin Olson, PureCycle chief manufacturing officer. "Streamlining the process of building and installing modular plants means we intend to build faster and more cost-effectively, thereby allowing us to increase our recycling capacity. Our mission is to have every person, household and business view polypropylene as a sustainable resource. This partnership will help us accelerate PureCycle's role in achieving this goal."

PureCycle says Gulfspan Industrial is set in a cost-competitive and highly skilled labor market with infrastructure available to support PureCycle's upcoming construction projects. Gulfspan is supporting existing strategic partners with the building of PureCycle's Ironton, Ohio, plant and the preplanning activities for the Augusta, Georgia, cluster facility.

PureCycle uses proprietary super-critical solvent purification technology to recycle postuse PP into ultra-pure recycled polypropylene (rPP) for applications spanning consumer goods, automotive, building and construction and industrial uses. The company says it can process a wide range of end-of-life PP with varying levels of contamination and effectively remove containments to create an ultra-pure PP resin.

Construction on the flagship Ohio recycling facility is underway and expected to begin commercial production in the fourth quarter of 2022. PureCycle says it has already presold more than 20 years of rPP output from the Ohio plant and announced in July the location for the first cluster facility in Georgia. This second location will have room for up to five processing lines with the capability to produce up to 650 million pounds of rPP toward PureCycle's 1 billion-pound goal. Engineering for the cluster facility started in the second quarter of this year, with construction scheduled to begin in the first quarter of 2022.