A chemical plastics recycling plant will be built in Italy to recycle mixed plastic waste.
The facility is being built by Versalis at Mantova in Italy. Versalis is a subsidiary of oil company Eni.
It will have a capacity of 6,000 tonnes per annum, but Versalis plans to progressively scale up its chemical recycling operations starting at other of its sites in Italy. The project is know as Hoop to reflect the circularity of it.
The company has signed a joint development agreement with Italian engineering company Servizi di Recerche e Sviluppo to use its pyrolysis technology to turn currently unrecyclable plastics into virgin polymers.
Versalis chief executive Daniele Ferrari said: “This project confirms Versalis’ strategy to develop a chemical recycling technology that complements mechanical recycling technology, which the company is already engaged in, with a goal to give new life to plastic waste.
“The Hoop project aims to create a theoretically endless plastic recycling process, producing new virgin polymers suitable for all applications and that are identical to polymers that come from fossil raw materials.”
