New owner for renewable plastics venture

Cargill has acquired The Dow Chemical Company's interest in Cargill Dow LLC, the 50:50 joint venture formed in 1997 to commercialize polylactic acid biopolymers. Terms were not disclosed. The transaction is subject to regulatory approval in Europe.

Cargill is the original inventor of polylactic acid (PLA), a polymer derived

from natural plant sugars and marketed by the joint venture as NatureWorks

PLA and Ingeo fibers. NatureWorks PLA is used in a broad range of

packaging applications including labels for companies seeking plastics made from an annually renewable resource.

At the same time, research conducted by National Recovery

Technologies, Inc. (NRT), a world leader in plastic mass-sorting technology, indicates that NatureWorks PLA will segregate from PET bottles as part of a fraction that is already being removed by reclaimers using NRT infrared machines.

‘Because the NatureWorks PLA will likely be in the same stream as common items like salad dressing bottles, vegetable oil bottles, mouthwash and other plastics like PVC, we anticipate that existing NRT infrared machines will not need to be modified to separate PLA from the PET stream,’ explained John Thomsen, engineering manager at NRT. ‘We also think that the PLA can be distinguished from PVC and other non-PET polymers, but further validation isn't warranted until larger post-consumer quantities of PLA bottles are available.’ PLA has also been successfully composted.