Total Project Incorporates Recycled PS with Virgin Material

French energy company Total SA has completed an industrial scale test run incorporating about 20 percent of post-consumer recycled polystyrene within virgin polystyrene.

The company announced June 19 that the trial, which followed a series of pilot plant studies, was carried out on an existing production line and led to product “with properties equivalent to virgin polymer.”

“Polystyrene is one of the easiest polymers to recycle,” said Jean Viallefont, Total vice president polymer europe.

“Our success highlights that polystyrene, which naturally provides outstanding performance for various applications, will be a significant contributor to the circular economy,” he added.

The French company also said that following the successful test run, it is now launching new measures to manage contamination of recycled streams.

This, it added, is to create “a robust process in order to handle complex polystyrene waste streams that can be implemented on our different existing production lines.”