Dutch circular chemistry developer BioBTX is moving its technology to commercial scale, with construction set to begin on what it says will be the world’s first commercial-scale plant to turn mixed plastic waste into high-quality aromatic chemicals.
The plant will be built at Chemical Park Delfzijl on the northern coast of the Netherlands and is expected to create 35 new jobs.
BioBTX will deploy its proprietary ICCP (Integrated Catalytic Cracking Process) technology to process mixed plastic waste that would otherwise be incinerated or sent to landfill. Through catalytic pyrolysis, the technology converts the waste into aromatic oil containing benzene, toluene and xylenes (B-T-X) — key chemical building blocks used in coatings, pharma and performance materials.
The resulting materials can also be used to produce Covestro’s isocyanates, MDI and TDI, which are used in products ranging from soft foam in mattresses to rigid insulation foam in refrigerators.
Covestro has been a shareholder and strategic partner of Groningen-based BioBTX since 2024, with a mid-single-digit million-euro investment.
"We've followed BioBTX's progress for years and are very happy to now see the point where the technology proves itself at industrial scale," says Thorsten Dreier, Chief Technology Officer at Covestro. "This marks a very important step. Moreover, it processes mixed plastic waste instead of a single sorted stream, which is exactly the kind of recycling we need more of at scale to make a circular economy become reality."
The facility is expected to recycle around 20,000 tonnes of plastic waste a year, producing approximately 10,000 tonnes of renewable aromatic oil and 8,000 tonnes of sustainable by-products annually.
BioBTX says its process could cut greenhouse gas emissions from the resulting chemical building blocks by 70% to 80% compared with conventional fossil-based BTX production.
"Reaching this key milestone in the development of BioBTX marks an important step in our journey towards our mission of making circular chemistry possible. I am very proud of the full BioBTX team and shareholders whose dedication and commitment has made this achievement possible. We are going to build our world’s first fully sustainable aromatic plant. A great accomplishment!” says Ton Vries, Co-founder and CEO of BioBTX.
The project caps a 14-year development journey, beginning with an idea in 2012 and progressing through laboratory and pilot-scale development to commercial execution.
While the first facility will focus on mixed plastic waste, BioBTX says its ICCP technology is feedstock-flexible and could eventually be adapted to other sources, including biomass.
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