Plastic chemical recovery for production of chemical intermediates at a Swedish chemical cluster

Research Project, 2015

The largest Swedish chemical cluster is located in Stenungsund on the Swedish West Coast. The cluster companies have a common vision for implementing industrial symbiosis practices in order to reduce the primary resource usage and environmental impact associated with production of chemicals and plastics. Feasibility studies have so far mainly focused on energy efficiency measures and on integration of biomass value chains, but no projects have so far been implemented aiming at identifying ways to include processing of waste streams at the site in order to achieve transition towards a cluster that it is fully integrated in a circular economy. This project aims at identifying concepts and technologies for thermo-chemical processing of recovered plastic waste streams, mainly polyolefins, at the cluster site also in combination with gasification of forest residues. In particular, the focus is on production of syngas (i) as feedstock for OXO-synthesis, (ii) for hydrogen production, (iii) for methanol synthesis and subsequent olefin production via catalytic cracking, (iv) for synthesis of substitute natural gas (SNG), (v) for combined heat and power production via gas turbine. The assumption is that the production of chemical and plastics at the cluster shall remain unchanged while fossil feedstock is replaced by recovered plastic waste and biomass. The potential reduction of GHG emissions will be quantified for a selected set of process options. The results of this study will be used as a basis for future larger projects aiming at assessing the economic viability of the suggested options.