In the old town of Koblenz, a multi-storey, architecturally outstanding residential and commercial building from the pre-war period with 27 flats, a penthouse and office space is currently undergoing energy refurbishment. With the special feature: the old 89 PVC windows and additional 24 balcony elements are not disposed of in the waste incineration plant after removal and replacement with new energy-saving plastic windows, as is still too often the case, but are recycled and reused in the facilities of VEKA Umwelttechnik GmbH in Hörselberg-Hainich near Eisenach.
The old PVC windows are first shredded and further reduced in size. Then they are separated by type into metal, rubber, glass residues and plastic in various processes. The latter is extruded and pressed through a melt filter to separate the last foreign particles. The pure PVC granulate recovered in the process is finally the raw material for new plastic windows with recycled cores, which are enjoying increasing demand.
Nationwide, Rewindo recovered almost 30,000 tonnes of granulate from old PVC windows, roller shutters and doors last year - that corresponds to about 1.8 million window units.