Versalis, the chemical branch of Italy-based oil giant Eni, announced it has started construction of a demonstration plant for its proprietary chemical recycling technology, Hoop.
The plant is located in Mantua, a city in the northern Italian region of Lombardy, and will have a capacity to process 6,000 tonnes of mixed plastic waste per year. It is expected to start operations in 2024.
Hoop stems from a joint project with Italian engineering company Research and Development Services (SRS), which owns the pyrolysis technology. The venture is aimed at developing an innovative technology that complements mechanical recycling by transforming mixed plastic waste into raw materials to produce new polymers, Versalis said in a statement. The technology integrates the plastics pyrolysis product purification technologies of Technip Energies (TEN), a French engineering and technology company working in the energy and chemical industries.
The project started in 2020, when Versalis, Eni, and the National Consortium for the Collection, Recycling and Recovery of Plastic Packaging (COREPLA ) signed an agreement to pool their expertise to collect and recycle plastic packaging through pyrolysis. Versalis said it aims to progressive scale-up the demonstration plant and build new ones, starting in Italy.
“The Hoop project is an important step forward in Versalis’ strategy to develop chemical recycling technology, complementary to mechanical recycling, to ensure full circularity for all plastics,” said Versalis CEO Adriano Alfani. “The project will boost the recycling of plastic waste, thereby contributing to the recycling targets at national level in order to achieve the ones set by the European Commission,” he added.
Chemical recycling is not currently recognised as a form of plastics recycling in the European Union, neither is the mass balance approach that would allow chemically recycled plastics to count towards recycled content targets.
The Hoop technology won the EU innovation fund award in 2023, a European fund dedicated to innovative technologies with low carbon emissions. The 41 winning projects received a total of €3.6 billion. Versalis did not disclose the amount of its award.