Renewable Building Blocks from Complex and wet waste Streams

A large share of CO2 emissions by industry is related to the production of fossil-based chemicals (approximately 3.6Mton oil was used in the petrochemical industry in 2021 and all this oil will be converted in CO2 at the end of life of products, if they are not recycled. By transitioning towards circular and biobased (bulk and platform) chemicals the CO2 emissions of this sector can be strongly reduced. However, as seen today, the quantities of potential biobased/circular input streams to provide these chemicals is by far not enough to source the demand of industry.

Project objective To provide industry with circular and biobased bulk and platform chemicals new value chains need to be developed where ‘challenging’ waste sources (e.g., agro/food residues, mixed biomass/plastic, sludges etc.) are converted by innovative technologies (based on hydrolysis, pyrolysis & gasification) into new chemicals. These chemicals can be used to replace current fossil-based chemicals. ReBBloCS will develop these value chains in collaboration with relevant stakeholders (private sector, technology providers & knowledge institutes).

In our workpackage a PhD student will develop a decision tool considering the full value chains in terms of economic & environmental impact to determine which route towards a specific chemical is optimal. The goal is to close the carbon cycles of the specific bulk- and platform chemicals considered by ReBBloCS as much as possible by utilizing and valorizing (fractions of) the considered complex waste streams.