Plastic as fuel? Why ‘advanced’ recycling gets mixed reviews.
Baytown, Texas, is a city that stands in the shadow of the nation’s oil and gas industry. Located only 26 miles from Houston, it’s been home to an arm of the Gulf Coast petroleum corridor for more than a century. Look to the western horizon from Baytown’s east side in the evening and you’ll see a smear of orange, red, and yellow pastels blending into the Texas sunset, as it slips away behind the nation’s largest petroleum refinery.
The city is also among the key sites for the oil and gas industry’s next significant pivot.
ExxonMobil has already broken ground on an operational “advanced recycling” facility that it hopes to open next year. The operation is expected to be among the continent’s largest, with a capacity to recycle up to 30,000 metric tons of plastic waste annually. And it’s part of a
