BioBTX is building a commercial-scale plant to transform mixed plastic waste into high-quality aromatic chemicals utilising its Integrated Catalytic Cracking Process (ICCP) technology. Covestro has been a shareholder and strategic partner of BioBTX since 2024.
Covestro
BioBTX transforms mixed plastic waste into high-quality aromatic chemicals
The plant is set to create 35 new jobs and will be built at the Chemical Park Delfzijl in the Netherlands. The facility will utilise BioBTX's proprietary ICCP technology, which converts mixed plastic waste that would otherwise be incinerated or sent to landfill, via catalytic pyrolysis into aromatic oil consisting of benzene, toluene and xylenes (B-T-X). These building blocks are used by the chemical industry in coatings, pharmaceuticals and performance materials applications.
"We've followed BioBTX's progress for years and are very happy to now see the point where the technology proves itself at industrial scale," says Dr Thorsten Dreier, Chief Technology Officer at Covestro. "This marks a very important step. Moreover, it processes mixed plastic waste instead of a single sorted stream, which is exactly the kind of recycling we need more of at scale to make a circular economy become reality."
The plant is expected to recycle around 20,000 tonnes of waste, produce 10,000 tonnes of renewable aromatic oil and 8,000 tonnes of sustainable by-products from it annually.
Ton Vries, Co-founder and CEO of BioBTX, added, “Reaching this key milestone in the development of BioBTX marks an important step in our journey towards our mission of making circular chemistry possible. I am very proud of the full BioBTX team and shareholders whose dedication and commitment have made this achievement possible. We are going to build the world’s first fully sustainable aromatic plant. A great accomplishment!”