On July 23, Vartega (Golden, Colorado, USA) cut the ribbon and officially opened its new 10,000-square-foot production facility in order to allow the company to take the next step and expand its carbon fiber recycling business and products.
Vartega's CEO and founder Andrew Maxey thanked the Vartega team, which currently has about 15 employees who help their company grow and its solvent-based recovery technology. Maxey also noted that Colorado, Colorado State University, University of Colorado, Colorado School of Mines and the Institute for Advanced Composite Manufacturing Innovation (IACMI; Knoxville, Tennessee, USA) are critical to the company's growth. "Our success-and our future success-are reflected in this ribbon cutting."
Maxey noted that he launched Vartega in his garage five years ago when carbon fiber recycling was in its infancy. Although the carbon fiber recycling technology itself has developed a lot, the market that may consume recycled carbon fiber has just begun to form-this combination has brought some market headwinds to the global carbon fiber recycling industry. Maxey said there are currently some applications that appear to be excellent targets for recycled carbon fiber, including self-driving cars, sporting goods, and additive manufacturing. "We are closing the gap in the material supply chain," he said.
IACMI CEO John Hopkins stands ready to cut the ribbon and notes Maxey's important participation and support for IACMI. Vartega said that IACMI has been leveraged to promote partnerships and collaborations to help the composites industry mature. "I appreciate that Andrew personally helped develop the industry," he said.
Starting from the new plant, Vartega will initially process 168 metric tons of 65% FVF carbon fiber prepreg per year to produce 109 metric tons of carbon fiber and 59 metric tons of epoxy resin. Most carbon fibers will be compounded off-site with thermoplastic resins for injection molding operations. Vartega is also equipped with a twin-screw extruder on site for some of its own compounding.
Maxey said that by the end of 2020, Vartega hopes to install its first hardware as a service (HaaS) product at the IACMI SURF manufacturing demonstration plant in Corktown, Detroit, Michigan. American HaaS is a modular, portable, 100 metric ton / year carbon fiber recycling system designed for installation in composite material manufacturing plants. Customers-manufacturers-will be able to use HaaS to process uncured prepreg waste on-site to recycle carbon fiber and resin. The resulting material can be integrated back into the customer's manufacturing operations or sold to the open market. Customers who install HaaS will pay for equipment leases and licensing technology.
The ribbon-cutting coincided with the IACMI Summer Membership Conference in Denver, Colorado, where about 200 people attended. The ribbon was cut off by Maxey; Hopkins, PolyPne's technical consultants Ed Pilpel (Avon Lake, Ohio, USA) and Katy Woslager, senior manager of advanced industries at the Colorado Office of Economic Development and International Trade.