Scholz, Hongqiao sign joint venture agreement for proposed recycling park in China

Germany-based Scholz Recycling Group, a subsidiary of Hong Kong-based Chiho Environmental Group, and China Hongqiao, an aluminum producer based in China, have announced that the two companies are a step closer in setting up a recycling-focused industrial park in Binzhou, Shandong Province, China.

The companies signed a memorandum of understanding earlier this year to partner on this project. The industrial recycling park is being designed to secure and prepare the more than 200,000 metric tons of aluminum scrap required per year by Hongqiao as well as 50,000 end-of-life vehicles per year.

The companies report that they have officially signed a joint venture agreement for this proposed park.

“Hongqiao and Scholz are now joining hands to build the Sino-German Hongqiao Scholz Circular Economy Science & Technology Cooperation Project and to set up a benchmark in the field of recycling and renewables,” says Zhang Bo, chairman and CEO of Hongqiao. “We collaborate, not only because we have matching strengths and technologies, but we coincide in our ideologies to pursue green and sustainable development as well. Rooted in the manufacturing industry, we are to recycle industrial waste, to take advantage of our strengths and values in the circular economy and to contribute more to our society’s green and sustainable development.”

According to a news release from Scholz, the new park will include a two-shredder processing line, one focused on end-of-life vehicles and another on aluminum. The company says both lines will be combined downstream with separation process technologies to feed the joint venture’s remelting plant to convert scrap into high-quality billets for Hongqiao’s aluminum production.

Scholz adds that next steps in the partnership include the setup and expansion of a local trading team in China.

“We appreciate very much that we take our first steps in China together with such an important partner like Hongqiao,” says Rafael Suchan, CEO of Scholz Recycling Group. “The opportunities provided by China’s green growth development plan based on a circular economy and the country’s aim to become carbon neutral by 2060 are of great benefit for the environment.”