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Plastic recycling - added value of EcoFlakes: Around 65% of recycled plastic in Europe is currently simply incinerated - with high CO2 emissions. The reason for this is that plastics can only be recycled cheaply if the individual types of plastic are cleanly separated (technical term: at least 98 percent pure granulate). With around two thirds of the plastic recyclate produced, it is currently too time-consuming or too expensive to separate the materials accordingly. Ecopals has therefore deliberately developed EcoFlakes in such a way that they are made from a combination of different plastics. This combination can be extracted relatively easily from the part of our plastic waste that has not yet been recycled.

Advantages of EcoFlakes:

Roads become more durable (up to 50 percent compared to non-modified bitumen)
Between 3 and 10 percent of the CO2-intensive petroleum product bitumen can be saved
Bitumen, which accounts for the majority of material costs, becomes cheaper (up to 20%)
For the production of EcoFlakes, Ecopals cooperates with recyclers who are located as close as possible to the respective construction sites so that "regional waste" can be used. This saves further transportation costs and therefore further emissions.

ecopals – from garbage to the street

Background: In around a third of the roads built in Germany, the asphalt binding agent bitumen contains additional plastics (technical term: polymer-modified bitumen). The reason for this is that these plastics make the roads more resilient and durable. But this also has a major disadvantage: Across the entire supply chain, asphalt with polymer-modified bitumen produces around 20 percent more CO2.

Ecoflakes as a solution: Across Europe, more than 19 million tons of plastics are not recycled every year, but simply burned. Ecopals has therefore developed a process together with the Fraunhofer Institute for Chemical Technology and the University of Kassel to modify previously unrecycled plastics so that they

can be used in asphalt. This saves CO2 because new plastics no longer have to be produced to make the asphalt more stable. At the same time, less plastic waste is burned.