Despite a legislative gap, BASF's pyrolysis oil-derived plastics are gaining downstream traction

March 05, 2020 | Case Study

While a flurry of investments have recently been made by major upstream companies into advanced recycling technologies, BASF was one of the first to enter the plastic pyrolysis space in 2018 when it used pyrolysis oil sourced from Recenso as a blended feedstock – combining it with traditional crude oil for refining – for new plastics production. Following this successful pilot, BASF invested about $22 million into pyrolysis developer Quantafuel to help fund a 16,000 tpa expansion that BASF will have rights to for the first four years of operation. BASF, alongside other investors in the plastic pyrolysis space, is fighting legislation that does not count plastic derived from pyrolysis oil toward recycled content requirements.