SWESTEP Plastic to Liquid to Plastic Recycling

People all over the world are throwing out large quantities of plastic each year, representing a huge sustainability issue. SWESTEP aims to address this by converting household plastic waste into sustainable oil and new plastic raw materials.

Over the past year, the Swedish green tech company has been working closely with Climate-KIC and the City of Copenhagen to carry out a feasibility study on the conversion of plastic waste to new sustainable oil. SWESTEP havedeveloped an industrial process capable of turning all hydrocarbon-based waste and residues, including plastic, into renewable fractions. In practical terms, this means that any organic waste stream can be considered as a feedstock, and duly be transformed into a wide range of renewable fuels or useful sustainable oil/liquids to be used again.

In theory, this process could have huge implications for how we deal with plastics, as well as waste management in general, as it could lead to the establishment of major circular economy loops into a city’s ecosystem, provide new sources of renewable energy, and create new revenues and jobs—effectively converting what was previously considered waste into a resource. One key aspect of SWESTEP’s technology is that it can mixe waste streams simultaneously just as effectively processed as sorted ones. This contrasts wildly with the status quo, in which mixed waste streams require appropriately sorting before the separate input material can be recycled.

Creating industrial inputs from waste plastic for industries that typically require fossil-based fuels or petrochemicals for major parts of their operations doesn’t just represent a welcome remedy to the problem of municipal waste, it also embodies potential to reduce the consumption of fossil-fuels and thus, contributes to climate change mitigation.

Source – Polyestertime, read full article here