Recently, the recycled plastics branch of China Materials Recycling Association and other eight units jointly issued the development report of China's recycled plastics industry 2021-2022 (hereinafter referred to as the report). The report pointed out that in 2021, the recycling amount of waste plastics in China will be about 19 million tons, the recycling output value of waste plastics will be about 105 billion yuan, and the domestic output of recycled plastics will be about 16.5 million tons.
Industry experts believe that the emergence of recycled plastics not only solves the problem of environmental pollution caused by plastics, but also reduces energy consumption, which is more conducive to ensuring China's energy security and helping to achieve the goals of carbon peak and carbon neutralization. In this context, recycled plastics have good development prospects, but they also face some problems and difficulties.
Plastic recycling industry chain has been formed
Fengling Plastic Industry Co., Ltd., located in the circular economy demonstration park of Suzhou City, Anhui Province, is an enterprise mainly engaged in recycled plastics. Li Menghe, deputy manager of the company, told reporters that in recent years, the company has continuously increased capital and technical investment, and worked hard to solve a variety of disadvantages and problems such as simple production process of waste plastics, poor equipment performance and weak product competitiveness, so as to "turn waste into treasure" after processing the ubiquitous "white waste".
According to Li Menghe, the company has set up nearly 200 waste agricultural film recycling points locally. After being crushed and cleaned, the recovered waste agricultural film is transformed into recycled plastic particles through hot melting and extrusion. Finally, it is processed by the production line of injection molding machine and "transformed" into products such as edible fungus turnover basket. "Since the production line was put into operation in June last year, it has consumed about 1.6 tons of waste agricultural film every day and produced about 8000 turnover baskets of edible fungi. In less than a year, it has achieved an output value of nearly 3 million yuan." Li Menghe said: "the company plans to build another production line for manhole covers within two months to strengthen and optimize our plastic recycling industry chain and achieve win-win environmental and economic benefits."
In China, enterprises like Fengling have sprung up in recent years. According to tianyancha data, by the end of 2021, the registration of recycled plastics related enterprises had exceeded 42000. Chen Yan, Deputy Secretary General of recycled plastics branch of China material recycling association, said that after decades of development, China's plastic recycling and recycling industry has formed a recycling system with wide coverage and large scale of waste plastic recycling network, and built a complete industrial chain for recycling, recycling and application of recycled products from waste plastics.
Favorable policies for the development of recycled plastics industry
The reporter found that in recent years, the state has issued a series of policies to encourage the development of recycled plastics industry.
The opinions on further strengthening plastic pollution control issued in January 2020 pointed out that we should actively adopt new green environmental protection functional materials, increase the use of recycled plastics that meet the quality control standards and use control requirements, strengthen the research and development of recyclable, recyclable and degradable alternative materials and products, reduce the application cost and effectively increase the supply of green products. In a series of relevant policies such as the notice on Solidly Promoting plastic pollution control, the opinions on accelerating the establishment and improvement of a green and low-carbon circular economy development system, the 14th five year plan for the development of circular economy, the 14th five year plan for the action of plastic pollution control, the action plan for reaching the peak by 2030, and the 14th five year plan for the green development of industry, which were successively issued in the next two years, Both have provided support and encouragement to the plastic recycling and recycling industry.
Xu Junxiang, President of China material recycling association, said that last year, China had established the construction of a green and low-carbon circular development economic system as one of the strategic objectives of China's economic construction during the 14th Five Year Plan period, and relevant policies were introduced one after another. These policies not only regard the realization of "resource recycling" as the core goal of the work, but also put forward two deeper requirements of "green" and "low carbon" on the basis of how to achieve this goal. In addition, the problem of plastic pollution control is also the common concern of the government and the industry, which makes the view that "recycling is the most effective means to control plastic pollution" a collective consensus.
Professor Li Jinghong, academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and head of the consultation and evaluation project of "problems and Countermeasures in China's plastic pollution prevention and control" of the science department of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, also told reporters that China has a large scale of plastic production and consumption and rich renewable plastic resources. Under the background of carbon neutralization and carbon peak, the renewable plastic market has broad development space. The development of recycled plastics industry is supported by policies. With the improvement of recycling system and the layout of large enterprises, the entry threshold of recycled plastics industry will gradually increase, and the market competition will gradually change to medium and high-end fields. The consultation and evaluation project of "problems and Countermeasures of plastic pollution prevention and control in China" will also focus on key links such as research on key technologies and development of plastic recycling, market analysis of recycled plastics, research on sustainable development model and green development vision of recycled plastics industry, and finally put forward the prediction of recycling and reuse of waste plastics The key technology and development trend of waste plastic recycling and reuse, as well as the strategic suggestions for the coordinated development of plastic pollutant recycling and technology promotion.