- Home > News > Industry News
Southeast Asia Plastic Recycling Boom: Color Sorters Distinguish PE/PP/ABS Particles via Material Recognition
2025-09-03Southeast Asia’s plastic recycling industry is in the midst of a boom, driven by strict environmental regulations and growing demand for recycled plastic. However, sorting mixed plastic particles—especially PE, PP, and ABS—has long been a bottleneck, until color sorters with advanced material recognition technology stepped in to solve this challenge.
Traditional plastic sorting in the region relied on manual labor or basic density-based methods, which were slow, error-prone, and unable to distinguish PE, PP, and ABS particles (which look similar to the naked eye). This led to low-quality recycled plastic and wasted resources. Now, plastic-specific color sorting machines equipped with hyperspectral imaging and AI-powered material recognition have changed the game. These Optical Sorters analyze the unique spectral fingerprints of each plastic type: PE shows distinct light absorption in the 1.7μm wavelength band, PP has a characteristic peak at 2.3μm, and ABS stands out with a specific reflection pattern—differences the machines detect in milliseconds.
A single high-performance Industrial Color Sorter can process up to 6 tons of plastic particles per hour, distinguishing PE/PP/ABS with an accuracy rate of over 99.3%. Unlike manual sorting (which handles just 300kg/hour with a 15-20% error rate), these automatic color sorters ensure consistent separation, making recycled plastic suitable for high-value applications like packaging and automotive parts. For example, in Thailand’s Bangkok recycling plants, customized color sorting equipment has increased the purity of recycled PE particles from 85% to 99%, doubling their market value.
Moreover, these color sorters adapt to Southeast Asia’s diverse recycling conditions—they resist humidity and dust, and their user-friendly interfaces let local workers operate them with minimal training. As the region’s plastic recycling capacity is expected to grow by 40% in the next three years, material recognition-enabled color sorters have become a must-have for recycling enterprises looking to stay competitive.
Welcome to purchase color sorters from China. We are dedicated to serving you.URL:http://www.cn-color-sorter.com/
Get the latest price? We'll respond as soon as possible(within 12 hours)