Waste was yesterday

The Managing Director of the DGMK, Gesa Netzeband, opened the event with more than 60 participants with a reference to the special location – the conference took place in the Schwechat refinery – and a heartfelt thank you to OMV as host and the event partners ÖGEW and Plastics Europe. Michael Bender (BASF) then gave a welcome address on behalf of the Conversion of Carbon Carriers department and emphasised the great relevance of the topic with the increasing demand for crude oil alternatives in plastics production. 
In his speech, Otmar Schneider, Head of Refinery, described Schwechat as a location in transition and referred to the integrated 10 MW electrolysis plant, as well as the co-processing of biomass and chemical recycling.

Looking forward to the guided tour of the facilities
In the meantime, it had become quite warm and the open doors not only let in fresh air, but also provided a view of the plants, pipelines and tanks, fuelling anticipation for the tour of the ReOil plants the following day.
Alexander Kronimus (Plastics Europe) set the scene for the technical programme by sharing forecasts on the coming demand for plastics and an overview of the various recycling routes, which led to the call for Design for Recycling. Peter Quicker could only emphasise this petitum, as he had directly selected the dirtiest waste fractions for his work (including those heavily contaminated with heavy metals) and tested various routes. His two take-away messages: 
1) Don’t discriminate against any technology as long as CO2 emissions are the alternative. 
2) Refineries are the perfect locations for chemical recycling because by-products can still be used 
Digital twin and hydrogen from waste 
While Jens Kaltenmorgen (TU Darmstadt) presented the development of a digital twin based on sensor data on the pilot and the benefits of modelling the subsequent scaling steps, the next speaker, Thorsten Liese (RWE Power AG), was already in the middle of planning a commercial waste-to-hydrogen plant in the Netherlands. 
Thomas Müller (Ruhr University Bochum) addressed the special group of polyurethanes (known from mattress foam and sneaker soles) in his keynote speech and presented approaches to breaking down the long-chain molecules in such a way that further use is possible. Marcus Lehnertz (RWTH Aachen University) is also working on such long-lasting plastics, who used the image of an almost perfectly preserved Pril bottle from the 1960s, which came from a landfill site, as motivation. His work focussed on catalyst design to make these materials recyclable in the future. 
With the H2Cycle (hydrocycling) project, BASF and its project partners are resurrecting a technology that was used to produce synthetic crude oil at VEBA in Bottrop and DEA in Wesseling back in the 1980s. Packaging material and other waste that is not suitable for mechanical recycling is used here and the process is subjected to a comprehensive lifecycle analysis. First result: reduction of the CO2 footprint by 60 per cent with the option of more. 
Stefan Pirker from OMV opened the second day of the conference with a reminder of the siren alarm at 10.00 a.m. – for some just a necessary test, for others part of the experience of meeting in a refinery. The first session began with contributions from AirLiquide. In his intro, Sebastian König presented the different synthesis routes for green methanol from plastic recycling and compared the corresponding CAPEX, yield and LCOM (leveraged costs of methanol). The scaling of the electrolyser plants from 1.25 MW (2018) to 20 MW (2023) and a planned 200 MW (2026) shows the ramp-up in the production of green methanol. 
Tamara Korkut and Florian Pontzen examined the economic viability of methanol synthesis in flexible operation by modelling the additional electrolysis process only when the electricity price is low, and electricity generation and conventional methanol synthesis for around 80 percent of operating hours when the electricity price is very high. Unfortunately, under current regulations, the economic operation of such a plant requires co-generation with biomass. 
“The biggest chemical company that nobody knows”. These were the words Andreas Neumann used to describe LyondellBasell. He impressively demonstrated how chemical recycling is implemented on a large scale, using the example of the Ferrara (Italy) and, above all, Wesseling & Hürth/Knapsack sites, where a large integrated site (“Cologne Circular Hub”) is being built. He emphasised that although Europe is at a tax disadvantage compared to North America, it has the advantage of being good at collecting and sorting plastic waste. 

Old hat in new splendour 
Frank Behrendt opened the last session on pyrolysis with the remark that although this technology is almost as old as incineration, it is now shining in new splendour.
Mathias Franke, Fraunhofer UMSICHT, put on this old hat and in his keynote speech initially focussed on pre-treatment, such as sorting (tracer-based or digital watermark), washing and density separation processes. The concentration of undesirable elements can also be significantly reduced in post-treatment during the distillation of pyrolysis oils, as he explained on the basis of analysis data. Andreas Meiswinkl, Linde, also focussed on the analysis of pyrolysis oil. He explained that pyrolysis oil, for example, exhibits a wider range of boiling temperatures compared to conventional feedstock. Many properties of pyrolysis oils can be handled well, but chlorine, for example, should be reduced to below 1 ppm before the oil is fed into the steam cracker. After the final hydrogenation, the speaker reported, the significant improvement in quality is even visually very clear and the oil is then bright and clear.  
With Marco Tomasi Morgano (Arcus), a change of perspective from operator to technology provider took place. This was accompanied by a shift in focus away from maximising energy efficiency and yield towards the task of “simply processing the waste delivered”. And this task is not as simple as it sounds. The speaker reported very openly on the teething troubles of the first plant. Among other things, there were heat losses in the oven and a cooling system that reacted too slowly caused problems. However, the carefully selected feedstock (traded as a product, not as waste) was also not without its problems, including stones and pieces of metal. Nevertheless, the 1,000 continuous operating hours were exceeded at the beginning of 2024 and within four months a first ordered plant could be significantly optimised and delivered according to specifications. 

Arriving in reality 
The quality of the feedstock was also the topic of Tobias Rieger from Fraunhofer UMSICHT, as he explained, “the MPO323 fraction (mixed polyolefin plastic waste) is not the same as MPO323” and other waste groups can also vary greatly. Despite successful decontamination processes, theoretically calculated yields could not stand up to reality. In summary, the speaker reported that although only around 25 per cent of oil suitable for refining could be produced, over 20 per cent of monoaromatics could also be produced, which also have a non-negligible market value and can be traded as a product. In the last presentation of the day, Stefan Pirker explained that the ReOil plant is a building block in OMV’s larger strategy to become a leading integrated sustainable fuels, chemicals and materials company. After his explanations, and even more so after the tour of the refinery, it became clear: they mean business. The installations for the supply lines to the large plants are already in place. 
Frank Behrendt (TU Berlin) found the appropriate closing words, stating that the strong participation from industry at the conference clearly shows that the conference topic has struck a nerve.