Cover story Advanced recycling Path to plastics sustainability? ExxonMobil’s plan to build 13 plants totaling 600,000 metric tons/year of capacity by 2026 is only the most dramatic indicator that advanced recycling will play a pivotal role in the future of the plastics industry. R ↘ Clay Boswell esin makers have been announcing ambitious circularity targets that rely explicitly on advanced recycling, suggesting growing confidence that it will play a key role in the broader effort to prevent the escape of plastic waste into the environ-ment and reduce carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions associated with production. Dow, for example, has tripled its target since June 2020, when the company’s “Stop the Waste” program set a goal of “enabling 1 million metric tons of plastic to be collected, reused or recycled through its direct actions and partnerships” by 2030. Three years later, in October 2022, the company replaced it with a new program, “Transform the Waste,” that targets the commercialization of 3 million metric tons/year (MMt/y) of circular and renewable products by 2030. “Through investments in key technologies, infrastructure and strategic collaborations, we are expanding our Stop the Waste goal to reflect the transformation of Dow’s plastic franchise and leadership to enable a circular economy,” says Jim Fitterling, Dow’s chairman and CEO. “We will increase the value of waste and enable a new industrial ecosystem to grow, which in turn will allow Dow to scale our ability to produce circular and low-carbon emission solutions.” Among these strategic collaborations are Dow’s partnership with Mura Technology, whose HydroPRS technology uses supercriti-cal steam to produce pyrolysis oil from plastic waste. In April 2021, the two companies announced a partnership under which Dow committed to taking the output from Mura’s first recycling plant, a 20,000-metric tons/ year unit in Teesside, UK, set to begin operation this year. In June 2022, a little more than a year later, Dow announced that it had expanded the relationship to include offtake agreements for up to four 120,000-HydroPRT facilities that Mura intends to build in Europe and the US by 2030. “This next step in our partnership and the resources provided by Dow will allow us to finance and dramatically increase recycling capacity and enable circular plastics to enter global supply chains at scale,” Mura’s CEO, Steve Mahon, says of the deal. Dow simultaneously announced similar partnerships with two other companies scaling up pyrolysis-based recycling technolo-gies, Nexus Circular (Atlanta, Georgia) and Valoregan (Damazan, France). Nexus is also chemweek.com 13/20 February 2023 | Chemical Week | 19