LYONDELLBASELL
Cooperation with German waste incineration plant operator EEW / Construction of sorting facilities for plastics waste
 EEW managing directors Bernard Kemper and Yvonne van der Laan (Photo: LYB) |
Polyolefin group LyondellBasell (LYB, Houston, Texas, USA; www.lyondellbasell.com) and EEW Energy from Waste (Helmstedt, Germany; www.eew-energyfromwaste.com) have signed a letter of intent. The content is the exploration of a “potential long-term strategic partnership to extract and recycle plastics out of incineration waste streams,” focusing on plastics waste for which recycling is not yet possible.
Under discussion is the joint construction of facilities for the pre-sorting of waste near EEW incineration plants. EEW is the largest German operator of waste incineration plants, which can “thermally recycle” about 5 mn t of refuse per year at currently 17 sites – 15 in Germany, and one each in Luxembourg and the Netherlands.
An EEW company spokesperson told Plasteurope.com that household and commercial waste destined for incineration still has an average polyolefin content of about 10%. The plastics separated from it can then be recycled at LYB’s mechanical recycling plant in the Netherlands.
Yvonne van der Laan, executive vice-president, Circular and Low Carbon Solutions at LyondellBasell, had recently announced the expansion of circular economy and to push low carbon solutions.
A possible first location for a jointly operated sorting plant could be the chemical park, Knapsack near Cologne, where EEW maintains an incineration plant. According to industry sources, LYB is planning to build a chemical recycling (pyrolysis) plant there as part of the southern expansion of the site.
Independently of the current declaration of intent, the polyolefin group had already announced at the beginning of this year, in addition to its recycling projects in the US, China, and India, that it would build a plant for sorting household plastics waste in Leiferde, Germany, together with Source One Plastics – an LYB joint venture with 23 Oaks Investments.
EEW is also already active in sorting on its own; according to reports, the operator plans to build a sorting plant in Delfzijl, the Netherlands, in the immediate vicinity of an existing waste incineration facility. EEW has also recently been traded as a possible supplier of plastics waste to be recycled in the 70,000 t pyrolysis plant planned by Duales System Holding (DSD, Cologne, Germany; www.gruener-punkt.de).
Under discussion is the joint construction of facilities for the pre-sorting of waste near EEW incineration plants. EEW is the largest German operator of waste incineration plants, which can “thermally recycle” about 5 mn t of refuse per year at currently 17 sites – 15 in Germany, and one each in Luxembourg and the Netherlands.
An EEW company spokesperson told Plasteurope.com that household and commercial waste destined for incineration still has an average polyolefin content of about 10%. The plastics separated from it can then be recycled at LYB’s mechanical recycling plant in the Netherlands.
Yvonne van der Laan, executive vice-president, Circular and Low Carbon Solutions at LyondellBasell, had recently announced the expansion of circular economy and to push low carbon solutions.
A possible first location for a jointly operated sorting plant could be the chemical park, Knapsack near Cologne, where EEW maintains an incineration plant. According to industry sources, LYB is planning to build a chemical recycling (pyrolysis) plant there as part of the southern expansion of the site.
Independently of the current declaration of intent, the polyolefin group had already announced at the beginning of this year, in addition to its recycling projects in the US, China, and India, that it would build a plant for sorting household plastics waste in Leiferde, Germany, together with Source One Plastics – an LYB joint venture with 23 Oaks Investments.
EEW is also already active in sorting on its own; according to reports, the operator plans to build a sorting plant in Delfzijl, the Netherlands, in the immediate vicinity of an existing waste incineration facility. EEW has also recently been traded as a possible supplier of plastics waste to be recycled in the 70,000 t pyrolysis plant planned by Duales System Holding (DSD, Cologne, Germany; www.gruener-punkt.de).
13.04.2023 Plasteurope.com [252569-0]
Published on 13.04.2023
German version of this article...