Warrendale, Pa.-based HydroBlox Technologies Inc. says it can now manufacture water management products entirely from multilayer plastic film, such as potato chip bags, candy wrappers and pet food bags.
The new process means the company can take a problematic feedstock available in overwhelming quantities and recycle it into stormwater products for homeowners, railroads, highways, solar array fields and more.
Founded in 2008, HydroBlox Technologies manufactures porous products that are placed in trenches to filter and direct the flow of stormwater. The company has two facilities: a 126,000-square-foot plant in Meadville, Pa., and its original factory in Conneaut Lake, Pa.
The plank products have been produced largely from polyethylene, polypropylene and some polystyrene, using a processing machine developed internally, including the controls.
Founder Ed Grieser, who is always looking for ways to mingle in more hard-to-recycle items, said in an email that he was driving home from the Meadville factory when he had an idea.
"I called the manager and told him to do X, Y and Z. About two hours later, they called and said the new process worked perfectly. The boards were stronger, moved the same amount of water and now were flexible," Grieser said.
Multilayer plastic film has been difficult to recycle because it is comprised of multiple heat-fused polymer layers — often PET, PP, foil and different types of PE — making separation and recovery extremely challenging.
But not anymore at HydroBlox, which has developed its first-ever drainage solution created entirely from multilayer plastic film.
The innovation will let HydroBlox triple the volume of multilayer plastic film it diverts from the landfill and launch a new product line that will incorporate post-consumer plastic in addition to post-industrial.
HydroBlox plans to expand this new composition across its product line in 2024, including HydroPlanks and HydroBlox storm water boxes.
"The bonus is now we can take in what absolutely had no outlet — multilayer film — and allow the other rigid [plastics] that may be more valuable to go to someone else," Grieser said.
A lot of the multilayer film comes from Seattle-based Ridwell, which offers a service that identifies recyclable and reusable items that the city does not collect, picks them up and matches those with partners that can use them sustainably.
"Our members are inundated with chip bags, candy wrappers and resealable food pouches and frustrated by a lack of transparent recycling options. We began collecting multilayer plastic last year as a part of this initiative with HydroBlox, and Ridwell members have responded in spades. There's tremendous desire at the household level to find alternative recycling solutions for this type of plastic," Gerrine Pan, vice president of partnerships at Ridwell, said in a news release.
The multilayer film also is coming from Reynolds Consumer Products' Hefty ReNew program, formerly called the Hefty EnergyBag program, which provides community collection grants for challenging plastics.
"HydroBlox has provided a responsible end of life solution for materials collected through the Hefty ReNew program for hard-to-recycle plastics, providing more people with the opportunity to make a difference." Lynnette Hinch, Reynolds senior marketing director, said in the release. "With HydroBlox's multilayer plastic film innovation, we can be that much closer to our goal of diverting more hard-to-recycle plastics from landfills and converting them into valuable resources."
Grieser agrees.
"The best part about what we're doing with the multilayer film is this is the perfect opportunity for our intake customers to truly practice 360-degree recycling and address another gigantic problem, which is stormwater mitigation," Grieser said.
The new drainage solution is "unparalleled in performance," Grieser said, "and it transforms a big consumer waste problem into a new feedstock stream."