The first commercial scale plant to recycle all types of plastic using high pressure steam in the U.K. began construction.
The plant in the northeast of England will cost 30 million pounds ($41 million) to build and ultimately process 80,000 metric tons a year of plastic waste after its starts operating by the end of 2022, according to a statement from Mura Technology.
Globally, around 350 million tons of plastic is produced every year, estimated to rise to 600 million tons over the next 20 years, with only 14% of this collected for recycling, according to the Ellen McArthur Foundation. Global plastic production is estimated to produce 390 million tons of carbon dioxide annually.
Mura Technology will employ its own HydroPRS supercritical steam — where water is heated and pressurized to such a point, its properties become gas and a liquid at the same time.
The system can convert plastics into the oils and chemicals they were made from in about 25 minutes, the company said. This product can then be used to create new plastics with no limit to the number of times it can be recycled, compared to only once or twice for most recycled objects currently.
