The styrenics recycling partnership of Ineos Styrolution (Frankfurt / Germany; www.ineos-styrolution.com) and Trinseo (Berwyn, Pennsylvania / USA; www.trinseo.com) is now a threesome, with Recycling Technologies (Swindon / UK; www.recyclingtechnologies.co.uk) joining the team as a technology partner. The duo said in autumn 2020 that it was evaluating the knowhow of the UK chemical recycling specialist, along with that of Agilyx (Tigard, Oregon / USA; www.agilyx.com), with an eye toward realising plans to build commercial polystyrene recycling facilities in Europe (see Plasteurope.com of 21.09.2020).

Goal of the project is to make polystyrene a circular material through depolymerisation. In this process, PS waste is returned to its chemical building blocks before being polymerised again into virgin grade material suitable for making new products. Life cycle assessment calculations, the partners note, show “significant decreases” in greenhouse gas emissions. Explaining why Recycling Technologies was selected to join the partnership as technology provider, they said the British firm’s solution provided the highest yields in the conversion of PS to styrene monomer and offered the most scalable solution in the form of its fluidised bed reactor technology combined with a highly skilled technical team.

Prior to building commercial PS recycling plants, the now three-member consortium plans to build a pilot plant in the UK in 2022 and continue developing the technology jointly. The test unit will provide information and data related to chemical recycling and operations to support future development of the commercial scale facilities. Ineos Styrolution has already announced plans to build a full commercial scale recycling facility at its Wingles / France site, and Trinseo is planning a commercial plant of its own at Tessenderlo / Belgium, scheduled to be operational in 2023. Each of the plants would aim to convert 15,000 t/y of PS waste back into styrene that can be used to produce new polymer.