SK Geo Centric, a subsidiary of South Korea's top refiner SK Innovation Co., will join hands with a global company to build a super-large waste plastic recycling plant in Ulsan, a coastal area of South Gyeongsang Province.
On Jan. 6 at CES 2023, the company signed a contract with
British company Plastic Energy, which specializes in plastic pyrolysis, to introduce the technology to build a pyrolysis plant in the Ulsan plastic recycling complex.
Recycled plastic produced through Plastic Energy's pyrolysis technology is recognized for its high quality and eco-friendliness enough to be used to create high-quality plastics that have been deployed in numerous consumer packaging products including those for food and cosmetics.
SK Geo Centric will start the construction of its pyrolysis plant in the Ulsan complex this year and complete it by 2025. It will have an annual capacity of 66,000 tons, the largest in Asia.
At the same time, the company plans to build a post-processing plant for pyrolysis oil with its own technology in the complex.
The two parties also signed an MOU for the strategic partnership to set up new advanced recycling facilities following Ulsan in the Seoul metropolitan area, China, Japan, and other key markets.
SK confirmed the official name of the Ulsan plastic recycling complex as the “Ulsan Advanced Recycling Cluster" (ARC).
It plans to gather three advanced chemical recycling technologies in the complex through strategic collaboration with global companies such as Plastic Energy, PureCycle Technologies of the US, and Loop Industries of Canada.
SK Geo Centric is already working with PureCycle on ultra-purity polypropylene (PP) extraction technology that removes pollutants from waste plastics.
Following an equity investment of 68 billion won ($55 million), it also signed a contract to establish a joint venture and secured exclusive sales rights in Korea and the rights to undertake business in China and Southeast Asia.
With Loop, SK formed a partnership on depolymerization technology, which dissolves plastic (PET) molecule blocks used in colored plastic bottles and polyester fibers and returns them to raw materials.
SK secured a 10% stake in the former and exclusive rights to do business in Asia.
Write to Ik-Hwan Kim at
lovepen@hankyung.com
