PolyConnect Recycling

Plastic drainage pipes for drinking or wastewater get second life

Plastic tubes? They are used for more than you think. For example, for the supply and drainage of drinking water, waste water and gases and as protection for cables. The Belgian association of plastic pipe manufacturers PolyConnect, which sits under the umbrella of essenscia PolyMatters, collects those old pipes and uses them for the production of new plastic pipes.

8 collection points
To make that happen, the manufacturers established PolyConnect Recycling. Companies replacing old plastic pipes and fittings in PVC, polypropylene (pp) and polyethylene (pe) can, while collecting new pipes from the manufacturers, deposit their waste there in a container for PVC and a container for pp and pe. The manufacturers have 8 collection points:

• Bruges
• Charleroi
• Eupen
• Harelbeke
• Kalmthout
• Nossegem
• Overpelt
• Temse

Reuse guarantee: incentive for recycling 
All PolyConnect manufacturers print the PolyConnect ♵PVC reuse guarantee logo on their pipes. Of the pipes with that logo that are excavated or dislodged within decades, companies are absolutely sure that they will be recycled through the PolyConnect Recycling initiative. Clients of works involving the release of plastic pipes can already stipulate in their specifications that contractors may only use new pipes with the PolyConnect recycling logo and that they must take broken pipes to one of the collection points or deposit them in a PolyConnect container on site. 

Processed into new plastic pipes
Because pipes in PVC, pp and pe have a lifespan of 50 years and more, the amount of waste collected is limited today. But that amount will increase in the future. The waste that PolyConnect manufacturers already collect today, they have it processed into material from which new drain pipes are made. After the infiltration crates and cable protection tubes, among others, which consist of up to 100% recycled material, they are a logical next step in the plastic recycling story.

New recycled PVC drain pipe 
Flanders is also encouraging the recycling of old plastic pipes. In response to Flemish legislation, manufacturers decided to market a new type of PVC drainage pipe that will consist in part of recycled plastic starting in 2026. This legislation stipulates that from January 1, 2027, public authorities must include this new type of pipe in their public contracts if they have plastic pipes installed in public works to drain rainwater and wastewater.