Two Canadian companies will reportedly collaborate on technology aimed at closing the loop on recycling. Nova Chemicals Corporation, a producer of chemicals and plastic resins, and Enerkem Inc., a waste to renewable fuels and chemicals producer, enter into a joint development agreement to explore turning non-recyclable and non-compostable municipal waste into ethylene, a basic building block of plastics.
Working together, the companies will research advanced recycling technology to transform hard-to-recycle municipal waste, including items such as plastics, household waste and construction materials, into ethylene at full commercial scale. Ethylene, produced from waste, would advance a plastics circular economy and help meet consumer brand goals for recycled content in packaging, according to the companies.
Advanced recycling technologies are a necessary component of moving to zero plastic waste by creating valuable new feedstocks from post-use plastics that cannot be easily mechanically recycled. The quality of polymers produced with advanced recycling products is reportedly indistinguishable from those made from 100% virgin, fossil-based feedstocks.
Enerkem is reportedly the first company in the world to produce renewable methanol and ethanol from non-recyclable, non-compostable municipal solid waste at full commercial scale. Its current technologies replace the use of fossil sources like petroleum and natural gas to produce sustainable transportation fuels and chemicals that are used in a broad range of everyday products.
For more information, visit: www.enerkem.com
