Eastman Chemical Company is an American company primarily involved in the chemical industry. Eastman has planned to invest up to $1 billion in France’s material-to-material molecular recycling facility. The facility would use Eastman’s polyester renewal technology to recycle up to 160,000 metric tonnes annually of hard-to-recycle plastic waste that is currently being incinerated. Eastman is a global specialty materials company.
Eastman’s proven polyester renewal technology provides true circularity for hard-to-recycle plastic waste that remains in a linear economy today.
The material is typically incinerated because it either cannot be mechanically recycled or must be downcycled with existing technology.
The hard-to-recycle waste is broken down into its molecular building blocks and then reassembled to become first-quality material without any compromise in performance. Eastman’s polyester renewal technology enables the potentially infinite value of materials by keeping them in production, lifecycle after lifecycle. With the technology’s inherent efficiencies and the renewable energy sources available in France, materials can be produced with greenhouse gas emissions up to 80% less than traditional methods.
The new multi-phase project includes units that would prepare mixed plastic waste for processing, a methanolysis unit to depolymerize the waste, and polymer lines to create various first-quality materials for specialty, packaging, and textile applications. Eastman also plans to establish an innovation center for molecular recycling to enable France to sustain a leadership role in the circular economy. This innovation center would advance alternative recycling methods and applications to curb plastic waste incineration and leave fossil feedstock in the ground.
The plant and innovation center is expected to be operational by 2025.
