Recycling Solutions completes relocation of microsphere processing plant from Donetsk region

Investments in the start-up of new production amounted to $334,000

Recycling Solutions, a Ukrainian strategic by-product and waste management company, has completed the relocation of its microsphere processing plant to Burshtyn, Ivano-Frankivsk region, and resumed production. This was reported to GMK Center by the company’s press service.

The company invested $334 thousand to launch the new production facility.

Since 2014, the plant has been operating in Druzhkovka, Donetsk region. Since the beginning of Russia’s full-scale invasion, it has been in the war zone and is still under fire.

The company has been undergoing reclocation since March 2022, simultaneously fulfilling two tasks: evacuating all equipment and products from the danger zone and maintaining production capacity to fulfill customer orders in full. Microspheres continued to be collected at TPPs located in the government-controlled territory of Ukraine. The issue of production was resolved by temporarily renting a production line in Lviv region that met the requirements for manufacturing products of the appropriate quality.

According to Vadym Khoroshko, Director of Construction Additives at Recycling Solutions, the line has now completed the last commissioning works, and its key components have been adapted to the realities of possible attacks on the Ukrainian power grid. The plant, with a production capacity of up to 2 thousand tons per year, has been launched and is ready to operate at full capacity. The company chose the new location for production based on the close proximity to the raw material collection sites.

«Part of the team moved with the production, and local residents were hired to fill the vacancies. We are currently recruiting for the second production shift. Now the main goal is to reach the planned production and sales volumes. The factory has also fully resumed the work of the laboratory, which is accredited according to all the necessary standards,» Khoroshko said.

The production process is fully automated, and currently there are 7 employees per shift. Starting in February 2024, the company plans to expand to two or three shifts, which will increase the staff to 13 employees.

According to the company, Recycling Solutions did not lose any customers in 2022-2023, but production volumes decreased as the restriction of access to Ukrainian thermal power plants reduced the volume of raw materials.

95% of the company’s products are export-oriented, and the first batches from the relocated factory have already been shipped to customers in the Netherlands, Germany, and Turkiye.

It should be noted that microspheres are environmentally friendly raw materials generated from coal combustion at thermal power plants. After technological processing, it is used in mechanical engineering, paint and varnish production, construction and backfill materials.

During the first year of the full-scale invasion, 800 enterprises were relocated to safer regions of the country under the government’s relocation program, 623 of which resumed operations at the new location.