An Improvement to Current Practice
Present processes of plastics manufacturing involve shattering of fossil oil and gas fractions in an equipment called a cracker, where raw materials react on a molecular level to produce various kinds of plastics. The researchers claim that this new process can be applied for all kinds of plastics, including those that have been stored in landfills or those that have accumulated in the sea. Aside from that, it also allows existing factories to use the infrastructure they currently have so there is no necessity to build a new plant.
What's Next for the Circular Solution?
The next challenge to overcome in their research is to validate its feasibility. In Sweden alone, there were 1.6 million tons of plastic waste produced in 2017 and only eight percent of this huge amount was recycled. This only means that a circular process for recycling plastic waste such as the one in this research is much needed, not only in Sweden, but globally as well.
