Brazil project boosts Indorama’s battle against marine plastic pollution
Polyester fibre producer Indorama has completed an expansion project at its recycled polyethylene terephthalate (PET) resin plant in the state of Minas Gerais in Brazil.
As a result of this expansion, the factory, located in the town of Juiz de Fora, has increased its capacity from 9,000 tonnes of recycled PET resin per year to 25,000 tonnes.
The project had the support of the World Bank and is part of a wider programme that Indorama has called Vision 2030. Through this, the group will spend $1.5 billion to take its capacity for recycling PET bottles to 50 billion bottles per year by 2025. PET is the most widely recycled plastic in the world, Indorama said.
World Bank support came in the form of a ‘blue loan’ of $300 million, through the International Finance Corporation (IFC), a private-sector arm of the World Bank Group. IFC’s country manager for Brazil, Carlos Leiria Pinto, said this was the organisation’s first ‘blue loan’ that focuses specifically and exclusively on combatting marine plastic pollution.
