In its latest report, Economic Impact of Plastics-to-Oil Facilities in the U.S., the American Chemistry Council (ACC) explored the potential impact that building plastics-to-oil (PTO) facilities in the U.S. could have on economic output and job creation. The report concluded that the U.S. could support as many as 600 PTO facilities depending on the production characteristics and size of each facility, generating:
- Up to 38,900 jobs supported by new PTO operations.
- 8,800 would be directly employed by the facilities.
- An additional 17,200 jobs would be in supply chain industries that are related to the plastics recovery industry and supporting the facilities.
- Another 12,900 payroll-induced jobs would be supported by the spending of the earnings of workers in new PTO plants and throughout the supply chain.
- $2.1 billion in annual payrolls generated by PTO facilities.
- $6.6 billion in capital investment by the plastics-to-oil industry to build new facilities.
- $8.9 billion in U.S. economic output from PTO operations.
- $3.7 billion related to increased oil production.
- $5.2 billion in additional supplier and payroll-induced impacts.
- $18.0 billion of economic output during the investment phase.
The recycling of plastics continues to grow and roughly three million tons of plastics will be recycled in the U.S. this year. While reuse
and recycling are the preferred methods of plastics recovery, it is not always economically feasible – or even possible – for all plastics to
be recycled, illustrating the opportunity for other economic means of recovering plastics. Because they are derived from hydrocarbons, plastics have a high-energy content that can be converted to crude oil and fuels, synthetic gas, and recycled feedstock for new plastics and other products of chemistry. Various conversion technologies such as mass burn, waste-to-energy, gasification and pyrolysis are able to recover the energy contained in plastics. Recovering this valuable energy through conversion technologies reduces waste sent to landfills and complements plastics recycling. Investment in the technologies — and associated facilities — needed to capture this energy value will contribute to sustainable development, create jobs, and has the potential to contribute billions of dollars to the economy.
“Plastic2Oil, Inc. is an innovation leader in this growing space,” said Richard Heddle, CEO. “Our industry is seeing increased demand and our
state-of-the-art processors are designed to meet the growing need that underpins this report.”
For more information, visit www.plastic2oil.com.