Korteks to Produce Polyester Yarn from Pet Bottles
Barış Mert, Korteks General Manager
Korteks, Europe’s largest, integrated, and innovative polyester yarn production center, continues to grow its sustainability-focused investments.
Korteks will produce polyester yarn completely out of PET bottles, thus performing a first in Turkey and Europe, in its Polymer Recycling Facility, which was commissioned with a 10 million dollar investment, in accordance with the Smart Life 2030 strategy that acknowledges sustainability as a way of doing business. At the facility, “RPET Chips”, which is the raw material of polyester yarn, will be produced from PET bottles and other production waste yarns, and these will be transformed into filament polyester yarns.
With its Polymer Recycling Facility, which will have a monthly production capacity of 600 tons in a total closed area of 17000 m², Korteks will now be able to produce with zero production waste in its virgin PES yarn manufacturing facility. It will be able to offer a wide range of products to its domestic and international customers, which can be used in all areas where polyester is used, from clothing to home textiles and automotive, produced with such an environmentally friendly production technique.
“We will reduce our greenhouse gas emissions by saving energy”
Expressing their great happiness for completing such an important investment during the pandemic period, Korteks General Manager Barış Mert expressed the following statements on the issue ‘‘This troublesome period that the world is going through once again reveals the necessity of building a sustainable life together. At Zorlu Group, we continue to take important steps in this regard for a long time by making sustainability a way of doing business in line with the Smart Life 2030 strategy. Under the umbrella of Korteks, we manage sustainability with a 360-degree approach at all stages from raw materials to business processes, from water and energy management to the final product. We are implementing a new generation textile concept based on innovation based on circular economy step by step. The Polymer Recycling Facility, which we have implemented with our understanding of a more sustainable life during the pandemic period, is one of the best examples of this. Through this investment, we will, on the one hand, use our resources efficiently; on the other hand, we will contribute to the reduction of the environmental impact created by plastic wastes, which are becoming a greater global problem each passing day. For the production of 1-ton recycled yarn, we will contribute to the reduction of approximately 110,000 plastic bottles, which are non-biodegradable in nature and are consumer waste. Thanks to this investment, which will recycle plastic bottles and polyester-based yarn waste to the economy, we will reduce our greenhouse gas emissions by saving energy due to the nature of the circular economy.’’
