Braskem and Nexus plan a chemical recycling facility near Chicago
Nexus Circular and Braskem S.A., the largest polyolefins producer in the Americas, as well as a market leader and pioneer producer of biopolymers on an industrial scale, announced that they have signed a detailed Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to secure the production output from a new advanced recycling facility planned near Chicago, IL. The new facility will have an initial capacity to convert over 30,000 metric tons annually of used plastic into new materials, with the potential to rapidly expand the processing capacity to over 120,000 metric tons annually.
Nexus Circular is a commercial leader in advanced recycling that uses proprietary technology and a leading process design to convert landfill-bound films and other hard-to-recycle plastics into high-quality materials used to produce virgin-quality sustainable plastics. Since 2018, Nexus has been supplying consistent, on-spec commercial volumes of ISCC PLUS certified circular products. In January 2022, Braskem made a strategic investment in Nexus Circular.
By the terms of the MOU, Braskem gains exclusive rights to the production output from this new advanced recycling facility, which supports Braskem’s strategic objective to sell 300 thousand metric tons of products with recycled content by 2025 and 1 million metric tons by 2030. Braskem America’s CEO Mark Nikolich said,”With the new facility, we will leverage Nexus’ proven, commercial advanced recycling technology to secure high-quality feedstock for the production of Braskem’s certified circular PP resins. Braskem has dedicated substantial resources towards reducing plastic waste and is making significant progress towards a more sustainable portfolio of PP to support our clients’ goals.”
Eric Hartz, Nexus Circular’s Co-founder, and President added, “Nexus is rapidly expanding our production footprint, beyond our current commercial plant, with leading companies. We are thrilled to have Braskem as a committed partner, in addition to being an investor, as we move decisively to address the outsized market demand for circular recycled products while helping to mitigate the plastic waste challenge.”
Nexus’ unique solution is end-to-end acquiring and converting used plastics into circular virgin-equivalent feedstock for meeting recycled plastics objectives. The Nexus process is energy efficient, delivers unprecedented product quality, and has diverted over 5.5 million lbs. of used plastics from landfills to date.
