Polytech Upcycling
Redesigning Recycling
Upcycling Waste into Value
Our Mission: "Waste-to-Value"
By changing the ECONOMICS of recycling through UPCYCLING to high-value chemicals and materials, we bypass the low-value of recycled materials and make recycling economically attractive. We make recycling viable, we reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and we save resources by using waste as the feedstock.
The World is Drowning in Waste
A Global Problem that must be solved immediately
Plastic recycling is imperative to achieve environmental sustainability. Here are some statistics and facts:
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Global plastic production doubled from 2000 to 2019 to reach 460 million metric tonnes. Of the 8.3 billion metric tons that has been produced, 6.3 billion metric tons has become plastic wastes.
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The majority of plastic waste is accumulating in landfills or sloughing off in the natural environment as litter. There are currently 5.25 trillion pieces of plastics in our oceans. Plastic waste accounts for 3.4% of global greenhouse gas emissions.
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Today, plastic waste can be recycled into various products, such as clothing, furniture, packaging, construction materials, automotive parts, etc. However, the quality and value of recycled plastic may degrade over time due to contamination, degradation or mixing of different types of plastics
Redesigning Recycling
We are a chemical upcycling company that specializes in utilizing plastic waste, particularly polystyrene, as feedstock to produce high-value chemicals. These chemicals, including benzene, styrene, and aromatic derivatives, cater to the needs of the cosmetic, fragrance, and drug industries. Our company's mission revolves around reducing carbon emissions, minimizing carbon footprints, and providing a stable and resilient chemical supply chain. Our target markets primarily consist of chemical companies operating in the plastics, cosmetics, fragrances, and pharmaceuticals sectors.
How we do it
Our New High-Profit Solution: Upcycle polystyrene into higher value products, increasing the economics of recycling. These higher value products can replace materials that their production created additional pollution and wasted scarce resources (economically and environmentally).
Our solution is unique in that we have multiple processes, each upcycling a specific resin and passing the next station the remaining resins.
Our UPCYCLING process has been accredited in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science (PNAS):
Mixed Plastics
An increasingly wide range of plastic resins are being used today, The challenges in recycling waste plastics are: not all products utilize just one resin, and this complicates recovery efforts.Mixed plastics are one of the lowest and least valuable of materials categories, and most difficult to recycle.
We are working on solving the problem!
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We employ multiple processes, each upcycling a specific resin and passing the next station the remaining resins.
Meet The Team
From the media
Our discoveries are featured by numerous news media including Phys.org, ScienceDaily, NewScientist, Radio New Zealand, etc. Below shows a few new media about Greg Liu and his inventions.
VT professor creates new technology to turn plastic waste into valuable materials
Greg Liu, a chemistry professor from Virginia Tech has created a new technology that can turn plastic waste into valuable materials, such as chemicals and fuels.
Professor Greg Liu, who has a passion for doing good and solving environmental problems, got the inspiration for this project after watching a documentary about the plastic pollution crisis.
“I was shocked by the amount of plastic waste that ends up in landfills, oceans, and incinerators, and the harm it causes to wildlife, human health, and the climate,” he said.
He decided to use his expertise in chemistry and engineering to find a way to recycle plastics, not by melting or shredding them, but by breaking them down into their molecular building blocks and reassembling them into higher value chemicals and materials.
After attending the workshop of "Closing the Loop on the Plastics Dilemma" in Washington DC, (May 9-10, 2019), he started working with his VT team on the science of upcycling plastics.
His inspiration came from his graduate studies on block copolymer lithography. In a typical lithographic process, he used to shine UV-light on a silicon wafer coated with a thin layer of polystyrene (then-called "polystyrene brush"). After the UV exposure, he noticed that the polystyrene drastically changed its molecular structures. In his own lab, he and his team mastered the use of UV-light to break down polystyrene into tiny molecular pieces. Later on, he and his team developed an even-simpler process to recover valuable components from polystyrene waste. The process is as simple as boiling a pot of pasta, but the outcomes are extraordinary! He could recover molecules that can be used for making medicines, fragrances, and cosmetic products.
His technology not only recycles plastic waste, but also reduces greenhouse gas emissions, saves energy, and creates economic opportunities.
He has decided to start Polytech in the VT accelerator program, which helps VT entrepreneurs and innovators to develop and commercialize their ideas.
