A new PET plastic recycling facility will be built in Australia’s Altona North by a cross-industry partnership, with the facility set to be the largest of its kind in Victoria upon completion. Pact Group, Cleanaway, Asahi Beverages and Coca-Cola Europacific Partners (CCEP) have formed a joint venture to build and operate the facility, which is intended to drive a significant increase in the state’s PET recycling capacity.
The plant, a cross-industry solution, will be built in an industrial precinct on Horsburgh Drive and construction will start in early 2022 and finish in 2023.
It’s expected to create more than 100 local jobs during the construction phase and 45 permanent roles once it’s complete. The capital expenditure for the project will be around $50 million.
Federal Minister for the Environment Sussan Ley and Victorian Minister for Energy, Environment and Climate Change Lily D’Ambrosio announced $6 million dollars towards the project from a total pool of $36.5 million in joint funding for projects under the Australian Government’s Recycling Modernisation Fund (RMF) and the Victorian Government’s Recycling Victoria Infrastructure Fund.
The new Victorian facility will be the second PET recycling plant to be built by the joint venture following the construction of a similar plant in Albury- Wodonga which will be fully operational next month. Each facility will be capable of processing the equivalent of around 1 billion plastic bottles – collected via Container Deposit Schemes and kerbside recycling each year. This will be converted into more than 20,000t of high-quality recycled PET bottles and food packaging by each facility, which will use state-of-the-art sorting, washing, decontamination and extrusion technology.
While competitors in the beverage market, CCEP and Asahi Beverages have joined with Pact and Cleanaway to form this joint venture to deliver a substantial increase in the amount of PET plastic recycled and reused in Australia. The cross-industry joint venture draws on the expertise of each member.
Cleanaway will provide PET through its collection and sorting network, Pact will provide technical and packaging expertise and Asahi Beverages, CCEP and Pact will buy the recycled PET from the facility to use in their products.
Minister Ley said the Morrison Government’s $190 million contribution to the RMF was facilitating unprecedented investment in recycling infrastructure, with the combined Commonwealth, state, territory and industry co-investment model on track to reach around $800 million.