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The plastics industry is faced with the challenge of producing their products in a manner that is at once circular and highly efficient. Increasing material efficiency is a crucial step towards achieving this goal. In addition to its negative impact on the environment, loss of good material also means productivity losses for plastics manufacturers and processors.

Initiatives such as ”Zero Pellet Loss” aim to prevent the waste of plastic granulate. The project identifies three processing stages where the majority of granulate loss occurs: unloading in the silo area, bag and granulate container handling, and via conveying lines and equipment.

But many plastic granulates are also lost within production itself. For example, metal separators used to protect processing equipment detect and eject contaminated material. This material must be disposed of, which means additional costs and loss of value. All the while, analyses have shown that the rejected material usually contains a considerable volume of good material in addition to metal foreign bodies.

The new metal separation unit from Sesotec, RE-SORT makes it possible to clean contaminated plastic granulate – regardless of the contamination source. With magnetic and non-magnetic metal contaminants reliably removed, these plastic materials can then be recovered for reentry into production.

The material is fed into the separation unit via a hopper. A vibrating chute separates the material, which then passes through the EXTRACTOR magnet system and the RAPID-VARIO FS metal separator. Thanks to a calibrated combination of dosing, magnets, and metal separation, it is possible to recover as much as 98% of the good material. The purified granulate can then be processed further. This increases both the profitability and the environmental friendliness of the entire operation.