In December, the Suez group inaugurated France's first recycling line for paper industry waste. Located at Chabeuil in the Drôme region, this shredding and sorting line, developed by the Suez group and Isère-based MTB Recycling, enables the recovery of strands, the residues from cardboard recycling that were previously buried because they were too complex to process.
To supply nearby foundries and the biomass boiler
The strands come from the recycled cardboard bales used in paper manufacture.
These rejects are made up of 28% metal waste from bale strapping. The strands also contain plastics and scotch tape, which surround the recycled cardboard. Recycling paper strands involves separating scrap from sorting rejects.
First, this line crumbles the strands. Once crushed, this mixture is subjected to an electromagnet to recover the iron.
The scrap metal recovered is then purified using an air separator, a system that separates materials according to weight.
Finally, it is sent to other sites to be resold and recycled as foundry material.
The sorting residue is transported to its storage location, awaiting use in the biomass boiler at the Suez chemical platform in Roussillon, Isère. This energy recovery unit supplies nearby industrial plants.
7,500 tonnes of strands will be processed each year at Chabeuil.
4 years of development and 2 million euros of investment
This process is a first in France, and required an investment of two million euros, financed by the water and waste management group and supported by the French Environment and Energy Management Agency (Ademe).
"For the past four years, we've been working on developing a process that's unique in France and enables all cardboard recycling waste to be recovered" says Laurent Carrot, Managing Director of Suez's Recycling & Valorisation business line, in a press release.
"With the rise of e-commerce and the profusion of cardboard and packaging to be recycled, this solution is a lever for waste reduction and resource circularity."
