The Trump administration recently removed a major roadblock for chemical recycling, an unproven set of technologies that the oil and plastic industries are pitching as a panacea to the world’s plastic pollution crisis. Now, amid an unprecedented lobbying push and with corporate allies ensconced in key regulatory agencies, the industries are clamoring for a nationwide buildout of chemical recycling facilities that experts say are highly polluting, disastrous for climate change, and almost entirely ineffective.
In promotional videos and policy fact sheets, often accompanied by professed commitments to a “circular economy” for plastic waste, these industries claim that sustainable recycling technologies — not limits on production — will solve the world’s plastic pollution crisis.
For decades, oil and gas companies have known that the majority of plastics — made from fossil fuel–derived chemicals — could not be recycled using traditional methods. But even as the industry faces state and class action lawsuits alleging deception, it’s now doubling down on a campaign to persuade lawmakers and regulators to embrace “advanced recycling,” or chemical recycling.
The term is a catchall for various chemical processes that convert plastic waste into chemicals and fuels, which could then theoretically be used to make new plastic and reduce reliance on virgin fossil fuels. The problem? There’s scant evidence that the method actually works — but there is evidence that it generates hazardous waste and toxic emissions, harming human health and the environment.
Fossil fuel companies are working hard to ensure that chemical recycling wins over the American public because plastic is one of Big Oil’s last lifelines. As the world’s…
Auteur: Schuyler Mitchell
