Terrapure opens plastics recycling facility in Quebec

Terrapure Environmental, a battery recycler headquartered in Burlington, Ontario, recently celebrated the grand opening of a new plastics recycling facility at its battery recycling plant in Ville de Sainte-Catherine, Quebec.

The company says the new facility is the largest of its kind in Canada and will allow it to further contribute to the circularity of the economy of Quebec and Canada by recycling plastic battery casings for reuse in the creation of new products.

“The opening of this facility is a significant milestone for our company, one that demonstrates not only our commitment to protecting the environment but also to growing our operations in Quebec,” Terrapure President and CEO Ryan Reid says. “By adding plastic recycling to our well-established lead battery recycling capabilities, we are able to further close the recycling loop for our battery manufacturing customers.”

The company says its recycling process, which includes washing and shredding the polypropylene (PP) chips from used battery casings, followed by extrusion of the chips to create plastic pellets approximately 3 millimeters in diameter, is completed entirely at Terrapure’s Ville de Sainte-Catherine location. The company adds it invested close to $30 million to develop the new facility, which currently operates 16 hours per day, five days per week, and employs around 15 full-time workers.

The pellets are shipped to customers throughout North America by truck or rail to produce new items, including new battery casings. Terrapure says it can produce approximately 10,000 tons of recycled PP pellets annually.

Terrapure says it provides a vital service that not only recovers value from what would otherwise be a hazardous waste that would be disposed of but also helps conserve natural resources and protect the environment.

Lead batteries, the company adds, are the most recycled consumer and industrial product in North America, with about 99 percent of batteries recovered and recycled, and the components can be reused infinitely. Additionally, recycling plastic battery casings for reuse generates between 57 percent and 66 percent fewer greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions at Terrapure’s facilities than the process to produce plastic from conventional manufacturing, according to recent GHG assessments.

“We’re proud to add plastic recycling to our operations in Ville de Ste-Catherine,” Terrapure Plastics Recycling Operations Manager Martin Fournier says. “This state-of-the-art recycling process allows us to add even more value for our customers and further establishes Terrapure as a circular economy leader.”

The company says it recovers over 90 percent of the constituent components in batteries. Each year at its Ville de Sainte-Catherine and Mississauga, Ontario, facilities, it recycles 12 million end-of-life batteries and has the ability to recover up to 134,000 tons of lead and 15,000 tons of PP pellets to be reused in the manufacturing of new batteries. The company employs more than 340 people, including over 220 in Quebec.