22-04-2026

Understanding performance: why OEE matters?

How well is a recycling plant really performing? It is a simple question, but not always a simple answer. Many facilities measure output, some track downtime, others focus on quality. Each metric is important, but looking at them separately rarely gives the full picture. That is where OEE comes in.

Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE) combines three critical factors into one clear performance indicator:

Availability

Is the equipment running when it should be?

Performance

Is it operating at the expected capacity?

Quality

Is the output meeting the required standard?

Together, these metrics help operators and plant managers understand where losses occur and where the biggest opportunities for improvement can be found.

In recycling operations, even small disruptions can create major consequences. A machine slowdown, an unnoticed quality drop, or repeated short stops can impact the performance of the full line. Without visibility, these issues often remain hidden until the results are already affected. That is why real-time performance insight is becoming essential. By automatically capturing and analyzing OEE data, plants can move from assumptions to facts. They can identify bottlenecks faster, prioritize the right actions, and improve performance continuously.

For us, OEE is not just a KPI. It is one of the foundations of smarter plant management, and one of the building blocks behind the path toward the NextGen MRF. Because before you can optimize performance, you first need to understand it.

Watch Episode 2 of our journey.

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16-04-2026

The missing piece of the puzzle

Modern recycling plants generate more data than ever before. Machine sensors, bunker levels, throughput figures, alarms, maintenance logs, quality reports – valuable information is available across the operation every day. Yet for many plants, one challenge remains the same: turning that information into clear decisions.

Data often exists in separate systems, operators remain relying on purely own experience, and performance issues are only noticed once they begin affecting output. This way, improvement opportunities can remain hidden in plain sight.

That was the starting point for our digitalization team. We asked a simple question: what if the answers were already there, just not yet connected?

What followed was a collaboration between engineers, product specialists, and data experts who began looking at plant operations differently. Not by adding complexity, but by bringing existing information together in a smarter and more practical way. Patterns became visible, relationships between machine settings and plant performance became clearer, and operational blind spots could finally be addressed.

This became the first step toward something much bigger – a new way for operators and managers to interact with their recycling plants built on transparency and insight.

Sometimes it begins by finding the missing piece. Watch Episode 1 of our journey here.

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07-04-2026

From complexity to control: a customer perspective

As recycling plants become more advanced, operating them successfully requires more than experience alone. It requires visibility, understanding, and the ability to act at the right moment. In our latest video, Twan Hesselmans, a general director and co-owner of Broeckx Plastic Recycling, shares insights from the commissioning of their newest recycling plant-developed in close collaboration with the Bollegraaf Group.

This plant represents a new level of ambition. With a unique separation concept and high performance expectations, every part of the process needs to operate at its full potential. For the customer, the challenges are clear and familiar across the industry: balancing performance targets with machine settings, managing maintenance routines, and responding to constantly changing material streams; all while avoiding costly downtime and quality losses.

But beyond these challenges lies a clear expectation for the future: a plant that is not only efficient, but also transparent and predictable.
This is where the next chapter begins.

Please follow this link to watch the video.

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24-03-2026

Meet the brains behind the autonomous recycling

Behind every innovation, there is a team that dares to rethink the way the standard processes are designed. At Bollegraaf, that team brings together engineers, data specialists, and product managers who share one common ambition: to change the way recycling facilities are operated and optimized.

Our digitalization team is formed by people from different technical backgrounds and disciplines, united by curiosity and passion for their work. They ask questions and look for patterns where others see complexity. And most importantly, they stay close to the people who operate recycling plants every day. For our specialists, real innovation starts with understanding the challenges on the ground, and their main focus is turning those daily challenges into clear, actionable insights.

The NextGen MRF project is a direct result of this mindset. This is a foundation of the journey toward autonomous recycling where systems do not replace human expertise, but support it. It combines engineering knowledge, real operational experience, and intelligent data and turns them into tools that help customers better understand and manage their processes.

We are proud to say we have built the right team to shape what comes next.

13-03-2026

What does the next chapter in the development of a recycling plant actually look like in practice?

Tom Wijkel, Product Manager at Bollegraaf Group and leader of the NextGen MRF innovation project, shares his vision for the future of intelligent, data-driven recycling facilities.

“From my perspective, it starts with a simple realization: recycling plants have reached a level of complexity that can no longer be managed by human experience alone. Not because operators lack skill. On the opposite, many of them know their installations better than anyone else. But even the best operator cannot simultaneously monitor dozens of machines, changing material streams, energy consumption, maintenance routine, and product quality targets.

At the same time, recycling plants generate more operational data than ever before. The opportunity, as I see it, is not simply collecting more data. The real opportunity lies in connecting and structuring it.

The emergence of autonomous recycling plants is the direction I believe the industry will inevitably move toward. Within these facilities the role of the operator will not disappear but evolve. In the future, operators will spend less time reacting to problems and more time steering the process. This shift from reacting to anticipating is where digitalization truly begins to make a difference. This is where the idea behind NextGen MRF comes from.

For me, automation in recycling is not about adding more technology to already complex plants. It is about making those plants understandable again. Giving operators clarity. Giving plant managers confidence in their decisions. And giving organizations the ability to continuously improve their performance rather than fighting the same problems every day.

Because in the end, the real value of digitalization is not technology itself.
It is giving the people running these plants the visibility and control they need to operate at the level the industry now demands.

And we believe this is only the beginning.”

10-02-2026

Something big is coming to recycling plants

For years, the success of a recycling plant relied heavily on the experience of its operators, on skills built over decades, finely tuned machines, and fast reactions to maintenance issues as they occurred. This way of working was effective and reliable. Until now. Today, the recycling industry is facing fundamental change, and with it unprecedented pressure. Pressure that can no longer be managed manually.

Purity standards, material traceability, and regulatory requirements are tightening. Compliance is no longer optional. At the same time, these changes are happening faster than most plants and operators can realistically keep up with.

There is also a growing paradox: skilled labor is becoming harder to find, while input materials are becoming more complex. Experienced operators are scarce, and many plants depend on decisions made by only a few key individuals. Even the most skilled among them struggle with today’s material streams containing composite packaging, multilayer materials, bio-plastics, and black plastics. Manual adjustments that once worked simply cannot keep pace with this variability. One person cannot continuously optimize dozens of machines, recipes, and shifts. And when that expert leaves, performance often drops right away.

AI, data collection, and advanced analytics are often seen as the answer. Yet in most plants, even when data is being collected, it almost never turns into actionable insight. Operators still lack transparency, measurable performance, and systems that explain why something happened, not just show that it happened.

Something big is coming to recycling plants. The next chapter of recycling will be powered by intelligence built into every decision.

To be continued…