10
Sep
Installations
The new line designed and manufactured by FOR REC has been successfully installed and tested in Bordeaux.
The Derichebourg group, a leading company in France for the treatment of R1 (refrigeration and air conditioning appliances) and R2 (large domestic appliances) has chosen FOR REC’s technology and experience for a treatment line of 120 refrigerators/hour.
But how is a refrigerator processed?
In the first pre-treatment phase the refrigerator is prepared to be introduced into the processing line. The pre-treatment is manual, and the operators separate some components from the refrigerator such as the electric cable, any glass shelves, lamps, electronic boards and wood.
The next phase concerns the safety or recovery in which the refrigerator reaches the emptying station of the refrigeration circuit where the compressor or the refrigerant circuit are drilled to suck the gas and oil contained and sent to a centralized system that separates the oil from the gas.
The compressor and the refrigerant circuit are subsequently removed by an operator using shears and sent for specific recycling.
Then the automated part of the system starts where the refrigerator enters the shredding phase. In each plant there is a shredding tower equipped with powerful machines that produce pieces of 30 and 10 mm up to pulverize the polyurethane. The refrigerator passes into the shredding tower where there are two shredders with different characteristics in sequence.
The reduced material in small pieces is then subjected to the various separation phases: magnetic separators for iron, wind sifter for polyurethane, densimetric separators for the rest of the components. These sequential operations allow the complete separation of all components, which are iron, aluminium, copper, polyurethane and plastic.
This whole phase is carried out in a sealed area to prevent the pollutants from dispersing into the environment. The air is sucked and filtered, and the gas sent to the final treatment system.
Polyurethane, which is the most difficult material to store, is sent to a compaction system to be safely transported to its destination.
This specific plant uses a cryogenic (with Nitrogen) system to treat the gas that is sucked during treatment and subjected to a low temperature thermal process. This treatment changes the state of the gas, taking it from the gas to the liquid one and therefore easily storable in containers for transport to specialized companies for disposal.
The line, the largest in the world, has responded to customer requests: the opportunity given to FOR REC and the challenge the company has accepted has led to good results and has confirmed the competence and reliability in the recycling sector of refrigerators. The technical department carried out a project that was flexible and attentive to the client’s requests and demonstrated continuous re-evaluation skills to achieve the desired success.
