Does chemical recycling have a place in EU policy?

Thursday 13.11.2025, SINTEF intern Håkon Slørdahl got to participate at the Advanced Recycling Technology Conference hosted by Institut Français du Pétrole Energy Nouvelles (IFPEN) in Brussels. The event showcased achievements in the development of advanced recycling technologies for plastics and highlighted the challenges of scaling up research into industrial innovation. Central to the discussions were the regulatory actions needed at the European level, alongside the funding mechanisms required to transform promising lab-scale solutions into large-scale recycling systems.   

With a particular focus on chemical recycling the conference provided us with an opportunity to engage with policymakers, researchers, and industry leaders examining how the EU’s evolving legislative framework, including the Packaging and Packaging Waste Regulation (PPWR) as well as the Single Use Plastic Directive (SUP) can support the transition toward a circular plastics economy. This transition is critical for understanding and reducing the flow of plastics into sensitive marine regions such as the Arctic, where major knowledge gaps remain regarding sources, transport pathways, and long-term environmental impacts, challenging the landscape of regulatory frameworks in the region, as exemplified in the gomplar project.

The meeting also allowed us to engage with industry stakeholders working to scale up advanced recycling technologies. As an intern studying sustainable development, it was interesting to be able to follow these conversations and developments in policy directly from Brussels, illustrating how the success of technological innovations relies on policymakers establishing clear conditions for new solutions to reach the market. The conference’s emphasis on regulatory harmonization, end-of-waste criteria, and investment mechanisms also directly relates to SEADITO’s multi-actor processes and decision-support components. In particular, the discussions around the Packaging and Packaging Waste Regulation (PPWR), Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR), and ecomodulation schemes offered valuable insights for SEADITO’s scenario toolkit (WIST), which aims to model policy impacts across European sea basins.  

Speakers at the conference highlighted the potential benefits of chemical recycling for certain waste streams. Representatives from industry and research such as Axens and IFPEN made it clear that chemical recycling makes it possible to handle the hard to recycle waste streams such as contaminated plastics and multilayer packaging. However, this technology is still in the early development stages, quite energy intensive, and the documented environmental impacts are highly case-dependent.  

As industrialization of polymer recycling is still a work in progress, and despite technological advancements, many solutions have yet to reach market scale. Industry representatives from Plastics Europe highlighted the importance of aligning policy frameworks to support chemical recycling as a complementary solution to mechanical recycling rather than as a one-size solution. Although industry actors argue that advanced recycling technologies are mature for market deployment, and emphasize that the missing link lies in the lack of incentives driving brand owners to buy recycled plastics. Policy actors highlighted the economic and environmental advantages of mechanical recycling, which remains the basis of Europe´s circular plastics strategy.  

While chemical recycling can serve as a complimentary solution for plastic waste streams that cannot be processed mechanically, it is essential that policy and investment efforts maintain a strong focus on scaling mechanical recycling considering its lower energy footprint and established infrastructure. The main takeaway as a student attending this conference was the fact that we need to make sure that we can reduce the amount of virgin plastics put on the market and increase the competitiveness of recycled plastics, which is one of the main goal of EU´s plastic strategy through policy such as the PPWR and the SUP.  

It was insightful to see how one can connect digital ocean modeling with upstream policy and industrial innovation, which is naturally critical, as evidenced by funding of many projects to this end, including not only SEADITO, but also Seadots, Ecotwin and Surimi. As Europe accelerates efforts to scale chemical recycling, reducing uncertainty about how these interventions influence marine plastic pollution will be essential. The integration of data, regulation, and stakeholder engagement will be key to unlocking circularity at scale. Especially now that we are still waiting to see how the negotiations towards a new plastic treaty progress, after the failed negotiations in August (see Emily Cowan and Rachel Haug Fossbakk´s posts about this). 

Pictures: Håkon Slørdahl (SINTEF Ocean)