<
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/apr/10/exxon-advanced-recycling-plastic-environment>
"ExxonMobil just launched one of the largest chemical recycling plants in North
America – but environmental advocates say the technology is a dangerous
distraction from the need to reduce plastic production.
On the surface, the latest addition to ExxonMobil’s giant petrochemical
refinery complex in Baytown, Texas, sounds like it could be a good thing: An
“advanced recycling” facility capable of breaking down 36,000 metric tons of
hard-to-recycle plastic each year. But plastic waste advocates warn that plants
like it do little actual recycling, and instead generate hazardous pollutants
while providing cover for oil giants to keep producing millions of tons of new
plastic products each year.
The facility, which began large-scale operations in December of last year, is
one of the largest chemical recycling plants in North America. Chemical
recycling works by breaking down plastic polymers into small molecules in order
to make new plastics, synthetic fuels and other products. Companies like
ExxonMobil have rebranded the technology as “advanced recycling” and are now
touting it as the latest hi-tech fix to address the plastic crisis, as
traditional, mechanical recycling has failed to slow the tide of plastic piling
up in landfills and the ocean.
ExxonMobil also says it’s planning to build chemical recycling plants at “many
of its other manufacturing sites around the world”. Though it hasn’t committed
specific dollar amounts to building new plants, the company is currently
assessing locations in Louisiana, Illinois, Belgium, Singapore and elsewhere.
By the end of 2026, the oil giant hopes to have enough chemical recycling
capacity to process roughly 450,000 metric tons of plastic each year.
But that’s a drop in the bucket compared with how much plastic ExxonMobil
creates.
In 2021 alone, ExxonMobil churned out 6m tons of new single-use plastic, more
than any other petrochemical company, according to a recent report by the
philanthropic Minderoo Foundation. What’s more, recent research has shown that
chemical recycling is worse for the environment than mechanical recycling in
terms of greenhouse gas emissions and water use, and in some cases, worse than
virgin plastic production. The process ExxonMobil’s Baytown plant uses, called
pyrolysis, is often so inefficient that many environmental advocates say it
should not be called recycling at all."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
