Carpet tile recycling initiative

Reducing waste to landfill

A carpet tile recycling centre that separates PVC from nylon and reintroduces it as a raw material is now operating at Ontera Modular Carpets’ Northmead plant in NSW. The initiative is expected to save approximately 200 tonnes of waste from landfill each year. As well as the environmental benefits, it’s also providing cost savings for the company in terms of reducing the raw material consumption of PVC for its carpet manufacturing process.

The recycling process has been designed in house and begins with the carpet being fed through a series of milling operations to grind the fibreglass, nylon and PVC substrates. The ground material then moves through a series of separators and sifting operations to separate the PVC from the nylon.

The extracted PVC product, after mixing with plasticisers, is then ready for re-use in the manufacturing of new carpet tiles. The nylon by-product is currently being evaluated for re-use as a filler agent at a third-party processing site.

Process/Plant Engineering Manager Jason Tamaro, who designed and commissioned the recycling centre at Northmead, is passionate about the project’s success. He says, “We wanted to create a real working solution that would ultimately reduce the impact of our operations on the environment as well as being cost effective for the business.”

Smaller recycling plants are planned for the future in order to capture and re-use waste edge trimmings generated during the carpet-laying process. Jason is also exploring mechanical changes to enable recycling of other carpet tile variants and future material changes.

The recycling centre at Northmead is designed to complement Ontera’s EarthPlus environmental program, which to date has diverted 340 tonnes of carpet from landfill.