While eco-friendly alternatives to plastics are sorely needed, we also need better, cleaner methods of dealing with existing plastic waste. That’s why we’re glad to tell you that construction workers have broken ground on what is being hailed as the nation’s first commercial-scale plastics-to-fuel plant.
Located in Ashley, Indiana, the new plant will utilize a state-of-the-art plastics-to-fuel process that sustainably recycles waste that has reached the end of its useful life – including items that cannot readily be recycled, like plastic film, flexible packing, styrofoam and children’s toys – directly into useful products, like fuels and wax. Brightmark Energy, the San Francisco-based waste and energy development company responsible for the plant, says that the outputs of this technology could also be used to produce the feedstocks necessary for manufacturing plastic again, thus creating the world’s first truly circular economy technology for plastics.
If the plant turns out to be a success, it could provide a much-needed solution to our plastic problem.
