Plastics
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Newlight AirCarbon: bioplastics breakthrough?
Newlight is converting (bio-)methane and air into polyhydroxybutyrate (PHB), a type of polyhydroxyalkanoate (PHA), a biodegradable bioplastic which it markets as AirCarbon. The product is ‘carbon negative’, biodegradable, strong, ‘never soggy’, dishwasher safe. Our AirCarbon technology review found some good underlying innovations, but was unable to de-risk cost and capex aspirations.
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Acetylene: production costs?
Acetylene production costs are broken down in this data-file, estimated at $1,425/ton for a 10% IRR on a petrochemical facility that partially oxidizes the methane molecule. CO2 intensity is over 3 kg/kg. Up to 12MTpa of acetylene is produced globally for welding and as a petrochemical building block.
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Purified terephthalic acid: PTA production costs?
A PTA price of $800-850/ton is needed to earn a 10% IRR on a new, integrated petrochemical facility, catalytically reforming naphtha into paraxylene, then oxidizing the paraxylene into purified terephthalic acid, with upfront capex cost of $1,300/Tpa. Feedstock costs, energy prices and CO2 prices matter too.
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Polyester: production process?
Polyester is the most produced textile fiber on planet Earth. Of the world’s 8GTpa of oil and gas production, 80MTpa, or 1% ends up as PET, via eleven chemical processing stages that span naphtha-reforming, BTX separation into paraxylene, oxidation to PTA, plus ethane cracking, ethylene oxide and ethylene glycol. This data file covers the polyester…
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Polyurethane: leading companies?
This data-file is a screen of leading companies in polyurethane production, capturing 80% of the world’s 25MTpa market, across 20 listed companies and 3 private companies. We see growing demand for polyurethanes — especially for insulation, electric vehicles and consumer products — while there is also an exciting prospect that EVs displace reformates from the…
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Alterra Energy: technology review?
Alterra Energy has steadily been refining its plastic recycling technology since 2017. The company recently signed license agreements with Neste and Freepoint. The technology is a continuous reactor, with seven discrete stages, using scavengers to remove contaminants, and patented hardware to minimize fouling and devolatilize chars.
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Polyurethane: production costs?
Polyurethane production costs are estimated at $2.5-3.0/kg in our base case model, which looks line-by-line across the inputs and outputs, of a complex, twenty stage production process, which ultimately yields spandex-lycra fibers. Costs depend on oil, gas and hydrogen input prices.
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Ethylene vinyl acetate: production costs?
Ethylene vinyl acetate is produced by reacting ethylene with vinyl acetate monomer. This data-file estimates production costs, with a marginal cost between $1,500-2,000/ton, and a total embedded CO2 intensity of 3.0 tons/ton. EVA comprises 5% of the mass of a solar panel and could be an important solar bottleneck.
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Agilyx: plastic recycling breakthrough?
This data-file is a review of Agilyx’s plastic recycling technology, after assessing the company’s patents on our usual framework. We conclude that Agilyx has developed a novel and data-driven process, to remove challenging contaminants from feedstocks. Although it may involve higher complexity, higher reagent opex, and some challenges cannot entirely be de-risked from the patents.
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PureCycle: polypropylene recycling breakthrough?
PureCycle was founded in 2015, went public via SPAC in 2021 and aims to recycle waste polypropylene into virgin-like polypropylene saving 79% of the usual input energy and 35% of the input CO2. Despite recent controversies, our PureCycle technology review is able to de-risk several ambitions.
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