SK Geo Centric and Plastic Energy will establish Asia’s largest recycling plant – Chemical Engineering

November 21, 2022 | By Mary Bailey

SK is geocentric (SKGC; Seoul, South Korea) has signed an HOA (master agreement) for the construction of an advanced recycling (pyrolysis) plant at its recycling cluster in Ulsan with Plastic energyLtd., a British advanced plastics recycling technology company, in Seoul, South Korea. The signing ceremony was attended by top management from both companies, including SKGC CEO Na Kyung Soo and Plastic Energy CEO Carlos Monreal. This follows SKGC’s announcement that it will partnered with PureCycle Technologies to build the country’s first polypropylene processing plant.

According to this HOA, an advanced recycling (pyrolysis) plant in Ulsan will be built by SKGC using Plastic Energy technology. The two companies also agreed to promote joint ventures in advanced recycling technology in Korea’s megacities and expand business in Asian regions. As the largest advanced recycling plant in Asia, the facility will be built on a total area of ​​13,000 m². with an annual capacity of 66,000 tons by the second half of 2025.

SKGC will also build a pre-treatment plant based on its own technology with a capacity of 100,000 tons per year. The use of pyrolysis oil in the finishing process will increase the quality of products. Moreover, with the help of this process, pyrolysis oil can be used in the production of various petrochemical products.

Founded in 2012, Plastic Energy operates two state-of-the-art recycling (pyrolysis) plants in Spain, one in Almería and the other in Seville. The company also owns several patented advanced processing technologies in the US and Europe. Currently, the construction of 5 more global advanced recycling plants is also being discussed with several large petrochemical companies.

The use of pyrolysis oil, which is obtained by heating plastic waste at high temperature, will help create a circular economy. The methodology is also called “urban oilfield” technology, as it extracts crude oil from waste such as vinyl.

The demand for recycled plastic is expected to increase due to increased regulations in developed countries, such as mandatory plastic recycling policies. According to the petrochemical industry, the pyrolysis oil chemical processing market is expected to grow at an average annual rate of 17% from 700,000 tons in 2020 to 3.3 million tons in 2030.

“We are pleased to partner with Plastic Energy, which has excellent advanced recycling technology, to build the largest pyrolysis plant in Asia,” said Na Kyun Soo, CEO of SKGC. “SKGC will continue to expand our cooperation with many global partners to achieve a plastic circular economy,” he added.

“Korea is an important market for advanced end-of-life plastics recycling. SKGC has a truly unique vision of deploying different technologies to recycle many types of plastic, and Plastic Energy is very excited to play a role in realizing that vision,” said Carlos Monreal, founder and CEO of Plastic Energy.