Unnafibras Textil Building Bottle-to-Bottle Recycling Plant in Brazil

The Brazilian firm Unnafibras Textil Ltda. announced plans to build a plastic bottle recycling facility in Sao Paulo, Brazil. The company currently operates three production facilities in Brazil (Alhandra, Santo Andre’ and Sao Paulo). At the present time, the company has a total production capacity of 3,600 tons of flake and 3,000 tons of plastic fiber per month.

The project cost is estimated at approximately $58 million, with roughly $23 million of the money to be used to build the PET bottle-to-bottle recycling project and for the new high-value line of production of fibers, and $35 million to be used to purchase secondary shares from the owners.

The International Finance Corp., a part of the World Bank, will provide about $13 million in equity financing on the project, while additional equity of around $28 million will be provided by DEG, Stratus, Proparco and Grupo Ecos.

The project will increase Unnafibras’s capacity with the construction of a new fiber production line and expand its PET recycling activities. The expansion plan will allow the company to convert PET bottles to food-grade recycled PET resin. The recycled PET will then be sold to local soft drink bottling companies in the country.

The investment also will go toward a project for a new production line of high value-added fibers; and the debottlenecking and expansion of the company’s main production site in the Sao Paulo area. 

The project is pending approval by the IFC’s board.