Plastic Recycling Innovate UK Grant - ReNew ELP receives £4.42m

The advanced recycling company ReNew ELP, based in Wilton Centre, Teesside, has been awarded a £4.42 million grant from Innovate UK to help build the world’s first commercial-scale plastic recycling plant using Cat-HTR™ technology. 

The process uses supercritical water, heat and pressure to convert waste plastic considered ‘unrecyclable’ through traditional mechanical means back into the valuable chemicals and oils from which it was made, for use in the petrochemical industry in the production of new plastic and other materials, entering plastic into a circular economy and decoupling the manufacture of plastic from fossil resource. The grant will aid ReNew ELP in the construction of the initial plant, which commences build in Q1 2021 and will see c. 80,000 tonnes of waste plastic recycled annually upon completion.

The technology demonstrates a complementary solution to sit alongside traditional mechanical recycling. It also offers those in the plastic supply chain an alternative means for disposing of their flexible and multi-layer plastic packaging, which no longer needs to be incinerated or sent to landfill, but can instead be recycled.

For further information about the Cat-HTR™ technology, please follow the link here to a short animation by Mura Technology, the global license holders of the Cat-HTR™ technology.

Mura were also fortunate enough to feature Sir David Attenborough and Dr Sylvia Earle on a short film released earlier this year – please click here to view.