Even A Houston City Council Member Has Had Enough Of ExxonMobil's Plastic Greenwashing Bullshit
A new report by an at-large Houston City Council member criticizes the form of “advanced” or “chemical recycling” of plastics known as pyrolysis, a controversial method city officials are backing through a partnership with ExxonMobil. The report from Councilmember Letitia Plummer, who is elected by voters across the city, warns that this technology, which ExxonMobil has integrated into its giant Baytown petrochemical complex along the Houston Ship Channel, “continues to encourage fossil fuel extraction while generating hazardous emissions.” The report echoes other findings and a California lawsuit that only a small percentage of plastic that enters the pyrolysis process results in reusable plastic materials, specifically propylene and ethylene. The large majority “becomes various chemical byproducts, many of which are burned as fuel, leading to further greenhouse gas emissions,” the report said.
Pyrolysis is a form of chemical processing touted by the chemical industry as a solution to a global plastic waste problem. It typically relies on extreme heat and pressure in an oxygen-free environment to produce oil and gases that can become feedstocks for petrochemical products, including plastics and fuel. Environmental groups view it as tantamount to incineration, and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency does not recognize turning plastic waste into fuel as recycling.
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A new report by an at-large Houston City Council member criticizes the form of “advanced” or “chemical recycling” of plastics known as pyrolysis, a controversial method city officials are backing through a partnership with ExxonMobil.
The report from Councilmember Letitia Plummer, who is elected by voters across the city, warns that this technology, which ExxonMobil has integrated into its giant Baytown petrochemical complex along the Houston Ship Channel, “continues to encourage fossil fuel extraction while generating hazardous emissions.”
The report echoes other findings and a California lawsuit that only a small percentage of plastic that enters the pyrolysis process results in reusable plastic materials, specifically propylene and ethylene. The large majority “becomes various chemical byproducts, many of which are burned as fuel, leading to further greenhouse gas emissions,” the report said.
Pyrolysis is a form of chemical processing touted by the chemical industry as a solution to a global plastic waste problem. It typically relies on extreme heat and pressure in an oxygen-free environment to produce oil and gases that can become feedstocks for petrochemical products, including plastics and fuel. Environmental groups view it as tantamount to incineration, and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency does not recognize turning plastic waste into fuel as recycling.
Inside Climate News began investigating the recycling collaboration, the execution of its recycling efforts and a new Exxon chemical recycling facility in 2023, after volunteers with the environmental group Last Beach Cleanup, using electronic tracking devices, found that plastic waste collected for the collaboration wasn’t being recycled. Instead, it was piling up outdoors at a private waste management business, awaiting a yet-to-be-constructed sorting facility planned elsewhere in the region. A joint reporting project between Inside Climate News and CBS News published and broadcast in August found that the waste collected for the collaboration was still stacking up at the waste management business, despite it failing three fire safety inspections. The company at the time had also not obtained all its required fire operational permits, including those for handling “hazardous materials” and “miscellaneous combustible storage.” Plastic is highly flammable and plastic recycling facilities frequently catch fire.
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The company markets its Baytown plant as “advanced” recycling that produces “certified circular plastics,” using accounting methods that suggest those recycled plastics contain significant amounts of recycled polymers, the lawsuit claims. But they don’t, according to the lawsuit. “ExxonMobil is correct that its ‘certified circular polymers’ are, in fact, identical to its virgin polymers. But this is not because co-processing magically transforms plastic waste into virgin-like plastics. They are identical because … ExxonMobil’s ‘certified circular polymers’ actually contain virtually no waste plastic,” the lawsuit alleges. Marketing materials give the impression that Exxon is able to recycle all plastic waste through these techniques, the lawsuit alleges. But in fact, the company’s chemical recycling facility in Baytown has a yield of only 8 percent, the lawsuit claims.
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https://insideclimatenews.org/news/13122024/houston-city-council-member-questions-exxonmobil-plastic-recycling/