Canada – Canada-based P&M Recycling has installed an advanced machine capable of turning plastic into heating oil. The US$ 200 000 recycling device chews through some 10 kg of plastics per hour, converting it into exactly 10 litres of oil.
The plastic-to-oil machine was installed at the recycler’s plant in Whitehorse, Yukon, and transforms rough granules of plastic into a gas that it then cools into the resulting oil. This blend of gasoline, diesel, kerosene and other liquid hydrocarbons is suitable to fuel almost any of the oil-fired furnaces used for heat throughout northern Canada.
The promising new device was inspired by previous, though far less efficient, innovations in the same area. It was Andy Lera, a local researcher and CEO of Rising Sun Innovations Incorporated, who created a small, test-scale model based on the plastic processor created by Japanese manufacturer Blest back in 2002, keen to ‘prove the concept’.
According to Mr Lera, the improved version, also built by Blest, can run day and night, and can handle almost any type of plastic – though the preferred material should be dry. The machine’s process is a clean one, adds the innovator, as its only by-products are small fractions of carbon residue, carbon dioxide and water vapour.
P&M managed to purchase the equipment with financial backing from the Yukon Research Center. It is easily sufficient to power the 600-square-foot plant and will ‘save at least US$ 18 000 a year in heating and transportation costs’, states P&M’s CEO Pat McInroy.
Though currently heating only the Whitehorse facility, he reckons it could continuously heat around 70 homes; therefore, the surplus oil will be sold at some point in the future.
Source: Canadian Press
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