TotalEnergies, Aramco and SABIC complete first conversion of oil from plastic waste into polymer in MENA region

TotalEnergies, Aramco and SABIC have for the first time in the Middle East and North Africa successfully converted oil derived from difficult to mechanically recycle non-sorted plastic waste into ISCC+ certified circular polymers.

The project aims to pave the way, in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, for the creation of a domestic value chain for advanced recycling.

The plastic pyrolysis oil, aka plastic waste derived oil (PDO), was processed at the SATORP refinery jointly owned by Aramco and TotalEnergies, in Jubail, Saudi Arabia. It was then used as a feedstock by Petrokemya, a SABIC affiliate, to produce certified circular polymers.

TotalEnergies, Aramco and SABIC complete MENA region’s first processing of oil from plastic waste at scale to make certified circular polymers.

“By leveraging spare capacity of existing infrastructure, we aim to produce circular products that could be scaled up at low cost. Aramco is considering multiple ways of tapping into new technologies and leveraging existing assets to support the deployment of circular, more sustainable and lower-carbon products,” said Mohammed Y. Al Qahtani, Aramco’s President of Downstream.

“It is a major pathway towards TotalEnergies’ target to produce 30% of circular polymers by 2030, and its strategy to build a multi-energy company with the ambition to get to net zero by 2050, together with society,” said Bernard Pinatel, President, Refining & Chemicals, TotalEnergies.

Sami Al-Osaimi, SABIC EVP Petrochemicals (A), remarked that the project shows collaboration across the petrochemical value chain to overcome upstream and downstream challenges in circular plastics. To this end, SABIC recently announced its target of one million metric tons of TRUCIRCLE solutions by 2030.