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With the aim of conserving our resources, new processes are being developed in industry to reuse raw materials that are already available. Kurt Allert GmbH & Co. KG, together with mwn, a metal construction company for recycling technology in Switzerland, has therefore developed a heavy-duty special metal conveyor belt for concrete recycling. Elias Nützi, Managing Director of mwn, gives us an insight into the recycling industry and the special requirements for our metal conveyor belt for concrete recycling.
 

Mr. Nützi, you and your business partner wanted to start your own business. Why did you decide on recycling technology?   
The fact that we are now active in the field of recycling technology was not planned. The inquiries evolved from the simple repair of agricultural and construction machinery, to the repair and adaptation of the shredders in the machines. This in turn brought us to the conveyors in the plants themselves. Since our customers have very specific requests, we developed and built each plant ourselves and this path thus led us to the plant engineering of recycling technology.
 

How did you become aware of us?    
We saw your conveyor belt in a customer's plant and thus got to know the Kurt Allert GmbH & Co. KG company. As a result, we got in touch with you. Since then, we have been very satisfied with the cooperation.
 

Your systems are used in the recycling of various recyclable materials, such as metal, household waste, wood and building materials. What requirements do our belts or your plants have to meet in this industry?      
In the recycling plants, we use your belts as distributors. The trend in recycling is that more bunkers are needed to save on manpower. For this reason, the bunkers contain up to ten hours of "fill material" that must be forwarded by the metal conveyor belt. The fill material can weigh up to 20 tons. The conveyor belt in the bunker must be able to withstand and transport this weight. For this reason, we need "heavy-duty" belts. This means that we have practically no use for conveyor belts with plate thicknesses of 5 mm and smaller. A thickness of 5 mm is now one of our minimum requirements in order to realize the longest possible application period.
 

To meet the challenge posed by a conveyor belt for concrete recycling, we have reworked our heavy-duty belt of pitch 152.4 with thickness 10 mm at two points. In order for the conveyor belt to be able to withstand the concrete block to be recycled, even at a higher drop height, a U-profile has also been added under each hinge. In this way, destruction due to deformation of the belt is prevented. In addition, a chain with flange rollers and increased breaking load is used. This has made it possible to develop a further promising application for Allert hinged steel belts.
 

You have already been working in recycling technology for 15 years and have completed many projects. What is exceptional about the concrete recycling project? What challenges had to be overcome? 
Currently, the cost of landfills has doubled and so the price of raw materials has increased exponentially. To minimize these costs, it is necessary to recover many more secondary raw materials than before. In this project, not only are secondary minerals recovered, but they are immediately reused in the production of concrete - which is why we have 32 options for shredding, distributing and sorting in this project alone. This results in many one-off products, tailored to the customer's requirements, which have not existed in this form before. That is the exciting thing about this project. It's not static, even after the project is awarded. On the other hand, we are technology lovers. We just do it. That's one of the reasons we were awarded the project.
 

A very interesting project. Based on the cooperation with your customers and looking at the market, Mr. Nützi, how would you describe the future in the recycling technology sector?      
This sector will grow. On the one hand, because of the high costs of landfills. On the other hand, due to the high prices of raw materials. As sustainability will continue to play a major role, the recycling sector will gain greater relevance than before.
The company Kurt Allert GmbH & Co. KG, with its knowledge and experience from the production of conveyor belts and fasteners, supports every company in the realization of its projects in every industry.