INNOVATION | CHEMICAL RECYCLING


Right: Evonik says the processing of used plastics into purified pyrolysis oil could represent a significant step forward for the circular economy


sion of the capabilities in chemical recycling. Plastics Europe, which represents around 90% of polymer production in Europe, announced planned investments of €8bn until 2030, increasing from €2.6bn in 2025. Several announcements in this direction have seen the light in the past months. TotalEnergies launched in March the first advanced plastics recycling plant, with an annual capacity of 15,000 tonnes, at its Grandpuits site, southeast of Paris in France. The new plant uses innovative technology supplied by Plastic Energy and transforms hard-to- recycle plastic waste from French households, which is currently sent to landfill or incineration, into pyrolysis oil to be used as substitute for petrochemical feedstock to obtain virgin-like quality plastics. “The start-up of the first advanced plastics


recycling plant in France is an important milestone in the conversion of our Grandpuits site into a zero-crude complex. Alongside Plastic Energy, contributing its technology, and our partners Citeo and Paprec, we are supporting the emergence of a brand-new French plastic recycling activity,” said Valérie Goff, Senior Vice President, Renewables, Fuels & Chemicals at TotalEnergies. Shell Chemicals Park Moerdijk in the Nether- lands started up a new unit that allows difficult-to- recycle plastics to be reused. With the Market Development Upgrader (MDU), the chemical complex can process circular raw materials on a scale. Pyrolysis oil, obtained from food packaging, is purified in the MDU and is then used as feed- stock for the cracking plant. According to a statement, eventually the MDU will be scaled up to full capacity and will handle up to 50,000 tonnes/yr of pyrolysis oil. This amounts to what 2.5m Dutch people generate in plastic waste annually. BlueAlp and LBC Tank Terminals were awarded a €1.5m grant, to support the front-end engineer- ing design phase of their planned large scale chemical recycling plant in the Rotterdam Region. The study will cover technical feasibility, detailed engineering, logistics, site implementation, terminal integration, permitting and financing. As Europe’s largest tank storage operator for pyrolysis oil, LBC provides direct access to critical infrastruc- ture within the Port of Rotterdam. Co-locating BlueAlp’s chemical recycling process plant at LBC’s existing terminal site is expected to create signifi- cant synergies, including heat integration and transport optimization, further reducing CO2 emissions and strengthening project economics. Röhm is investing in the development of chemically recycled methyl methacrylate (MMA), at


16 PLASTICS RECYCLING WORLD | July/August 2026


the German site of Worms. An internally developed technology enables the processing and upgrading of PMMA through depolymerization. Due to its chemical structure, the recycling process can deliver yields exceeding 90%. The new technology can be easily integrated into the existing MMA production plant, reducing the need for additional investment and enabling a gradual increase in the share of recycled feedstock in production. Mitsubishi Chemical and ENEOS completed a chemical recycling facility at Mitsubishi Chemical’s Ibaraki Plant. The technology was licensed from Mura, and by using supercritical water, heat is distributed more evenly throughout the material, resulting in higher oil yields. The facility can process up to 20,000 tonnes/yr of plastics waste. Petroleum company Idemitsu Kosan has also built a chemical recycling facility on land adjacent to its Chiba complex in Japan. The plant can process 20,000 tonnes/yr of waste plastics and began commercial operations in April. The com- pany uses catalysts originally developed for oil refining. Rather than being discarded as industrial waste after their refining life ends, these catalysts can be repurposed for plastic recycling, helping to produce oil with a higher naphtha yield.


Removing chlorides Evonik developed solutions to enhance pyrolysis oil quality for use in steam crackers, offering specialized catalysts and adsorbents to improve the quality of pyrolysis oil. Pyrolysis oil often contains impurities such as chlorine, nitrogen or silicon, which can compromise the efficiency and operational safety of steam crackers. Leveraging its expertise in petrochemicals and feedstock processing, the company began devel- oping technologies for pyrolysis oil purification


www.plasticsrecyclingworld.com


IMAGE: EVONIK


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