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T&B Fabrication (TBF) would like to announce the formation of Circular Industries Group, LLC (CIG), a majority owned TBF Company. CIG was formed by TBF, with over 30 years of in-house experience in steam autoclave processing of waste streams, and by the primary developer of an innovative “Circular Economy” approach to landfill based post-consumer recycle commodity recovery and recycling. The core component of this all-new recycling system configuration is the CIG “Rotopulper”, a constant-flow steam sanitizing and pulping vessel which allows for innovative sequencing of numerous proven recycling technologies to perform highly automated and efficient recyclable commodity separations. It is intended for all recovered commodities to be either recycled on site or to be funneled into nearby recycled commodity reuse, recycled product manufacturing or thermal/chemical conversion technology facilities which return chemical building blocks for production of similar durable consumer products or packaging.
- Although significant quantities of landfill bound ferrous and non-ferrous metals and rigid plastics will greatly enhance existing recovery of those recyclables, most of the commodities to be recovered by CIGs recycling system are either not currently recycled in significant quantities, are considered too difficult to recover, or are of insufficient value to warrant recovery and recycling. The low value landfill-bound categories CIG boasts as recoverable from household waste collections include food waste and other recoverable organics, mixed paper fiber, film plastics, textiles, glass, and household batteries.
- TBF and CIG professionals have performed R&D associated with MSW steam pulping for over three decades, and within the last 15 years “Rotoclaves” (batch-based steam autoclaves) were retrofitted to operate at ambient pressure in order to mimic future constant-flow steam pulping. This extensive, long-term R&D effort has firmly established constant-flow steam processing parameters required for commodity sanitation, necessary paper/paperboard pulping, and to facilitate efficient separation and recovery of an incredibly broad range of traditional and non-traditional low value commodities for recycling.
- CIGs next step will be initiation of a comprehensive “Demonstration Project” planned for early 2024. This project will include the retrofit of a commercial scale constant-flow steam processing vessel to Rotopulper specifications. The demonstration will thoroughly document Rotopulper range of operating parameters, throughput capacity, and provide MSW derived commodity samples to further demonstrate CIGs capability to meet and exceed feed stock specifications for numerous downstream, value adding commodity pre-processing, manufacturing, and/or conversion technology market applications. CIGs demonstration project will include a thorough comparative analysis of environmental and economic benefits of each value-added pre-processing option, and associated end market option, and will conclude with final Rotopulper based recycling system design. It is currently projected that a full commercial scale Rotopulper processing line will have a 1000 ton per day MSW capacity and will be fully scalable to meet the needs of the largest landfills.
- Upon completion of CIGs demonstration and commercial scale facility design project, the revolutionary Circular Economy themed recycling system will be marketed to public and private waste landfill owners and to entities interested in accelerating a more rapid rollout and maximum near term “Decarbonization” impact.