Mura Technology partners with Neste to advance circular plastic economy

UK – Mura Technology, has signed an offtake agreement with Neste for feedstock, marking a significant stride towards establishing a circular plastic economy.

The feedstock will be generated at Mura’s HydroPRS facility in Teesside, UK, scheduled to commence operations in mid-2024.

Teesside stands as the world’s pioneering commercial-scale plastics recycling facility utilizing Mura’s hydrocracking technology.

Initially processing 20,000 tonnes annually, the facility holds the potential to triple its capacity. Unlike traditional pyrolysis, the HydroPRS process employs water under high pressure and temperature to convert post-consumer mixed plastics into high yields of hydrocarbon feedstocks, encompassing flexible and rigid plastics like films, pots, tubs, and trays that are currently unrecyclable through mechanical means.

Independent Life Cycle Assessments (LCAs) have indicated an 80% carbon emissions reduction with HydroPRS, diverting unrecyclable plastics from incineration.

Furthermore, compared to fossil oil-based feedstock, HydroPRS products exhibit equivalent or lower Global Warming Potential, saving up to five barrels of oil per tonne of plastic waste processed.

Neste will refine the oil-like product from HydroPRS, contributing to circularity efforts. Mura Technology CEO, Dr. Steve Mahon, expresses enthusiasm for collaborating with the polymers industry worldwide, as they expand across the US, Europe, and Asia.

The agreement with Neste follows a prior offtake deal with Dow, where both companies announced plans to construct multiple world-scale advanced recycling facilities in the US and Europe, adding up to 600 KT of annual capacity.

Under the partnership, Mura will provide recycling technology, while Dow will serve as a key off-taker, utilizing circular feedstock to develop new, virgin-grade plastics.

This collaboration fosters a circular economy for plastics, enhancing the value of plastic waste and advancing global supply chains towards sustainability.

Dow’s Advanced Recycling Director, Marc van den Biggelaar, emphasizes their commitment to accelerating the circular economy for plastics, highlighting the expanded partnership with Mura as a significant milestone in this journey.

The announcement marks an important milestone in the rapid scaling of Mura’s revolutionary HydroPRS – Hydrothermal Plastic Recycling Solution – advanced recycling process, which, said Mura,  can be used to recycle even flexible and multi-layer plastics, which have previously been deemed ‘unrecyclable’.

Once deployed at scale, it has the capability to prevent millions of tons of plastic and carbon dioxide from entering the environment every year.

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