Process to Produce Fuels and Lubricants from Recycled Plastics

Background

Plastics are incredibly useful but most aren’t biodegradable, with less than 10% being recycled, leading to serious environmental problems. Polyolefins like polyethylene and polypropylene make up over 60% of plastic waste. Existing methods for recycling these plastics into useful fuels and chemicals have drawbacks like low yields, long processing times, high temperatures/energy use, and inability to tune the products for different applications. A new approach is needed to effectively upcycle polyolefin waste on a practical scale.

Technology Overview

Imagine transforming those piles of plastic waste into valuable fuels and lubricants instead of pollutants. This groundbreaking invention does just that through a cost-efficient catalytic process. Hybrid catalysts facilitate the hydrocracking of polyolefin plastics into high-quality fuels and lubricant oils with high yields under mild conditions. Not only does it tackle plastic pollution, but it also turns discarded plastics into a feedstock for producing high-value chemicals like fuels and lubricants in a cost-effective way. The versatile process can even be tuned by simple modifications to target different end-use chemicals, opening up possibilities for upcycling plastic waste into a wide range of valuable products. Get ready for a new era where plastic waste becomes a resource instead of a burden. For more details, please visit: https://www.science.org/doi/epdf/10.1126/sciadv.abf8283

Benefits

• Effective hydrocracking of polyolefin plastic waste with high-energy efficiency.
• Process has high yield and selectivity, thus eliminating the need for complex and expensive product separations.
• Flexible, controllable product distributions, targeting high value applications such as jet/diesel fuels and lubricants.
• Inexpensive waste carbon feedstock that can
  • Improve the flexibility of products supply chain
  • Eliminate dependency on petroleum
  • Make products cost-competitive

Applications

Several types of companies across different industries would likely be interested in this catalytic process technology for upcycling plastic waste into fuels, lubricants, and other valuable chemicals:

Oil and Gas Companies:

• Major oil companies (ExxonMobil, Chevron, Shell, BP, etc.)
• Companies involved in refining, fuel production, lubricant manufacturing

Chemical Companies:

• Companies producing bulk chemicals, petrochemicals (BASF, Dow, LyondellBasell, etc.)
• Specialty chemical manufacturers

Plastic Recycling Companies:

• Waste plastic recyclers and processors (Renewlogy, Plastipak, Evergreen, etc.)
• Companies working on chemical recycling of plastics

Sustainability Companies:

• Firms focused on circular economy, waste valorization solutions
• Producers of renewable fuels, bio-based chemicals

Some potential companies that could be interested:

• Agilyx (plastic recycling to crude oil)
• Encina (renewable fuel production)
• Nexus (novel catalytic processes)
• Anellotech (chemcycling of plastic waste)
• Novvi (renewable chemicals and materials)

The ability to efficiently convert plastic waste into fuel products, lubricants, and commodity chemicals could provide economic incentives and sustainable solutions for companies across the oil/gas, chemical, recycling, and renewable industries. Interest would likely come from both large established players and innovative startups in these sectors.

Opportunity

• Further information on licensing opportunities is available on request