From "White Pollution" to "Urban Oil Field": Vary Tech's Pyrolysis Technology Ushers in a New Era of Waste Plastic Chemical Recycling

Published on:2025-07-01

From June 12 to 14, 2025, the 2025 Ningbo International Plastic & Rubber Industry Exhibition & Ningbo International Flexible Packaging Technology and Film Exhibition concluded at the Ningbo International Convention and Exhibition Center. During the exhibition, the 2025 High-Quality Development Seminar on the Recycled Plastic Industry was held simultaneously. At the seminar, Song Zhen, Marketing Director of Vary Tech, Assistant General Manager of the Equipment and System Services Business Department, and Deputy General Manager of Vary Rili, delivered a keynote speech titled The Closed-Loop Future of Low-Value Waste Plastic Chemical Recycling to Chemical Circulation, elaborating on how Vary Tech uses pyrolysis technology to transform the global "white pollution" crisis into a high-value "urban oil field".





The situation of plastic pollution is extremely severe. According to a report by the United Nations Environment Programme, from the 1950s to 2022, the cumulative global plastic production has reached 10 billion tons, of which 5 billion tons of waste plastic have been directly discharged into the natural environment. By 2025, the total amount of marine waste plastic is expected to reach 250 million tons. Facing such a huge challenge of plastic pollution, the main methods for waste plastic recycling include physical recycling of waste plastic, plastic waste to energy, and chemical recycling of waste plastic. According to a report by Roland Berger, by 2050, the input capacity of global plastic recycling plants will increase to 290 million tons, of which chemical recycling will account for 70 million tons, with a compound annual growth rate as high as 13%, showing huge development potential.

Vary Tech, which has deeply cultivated the field of solid waste resource utilization for 20 years and served more than 1,000 solid waste disposal enterprises globally, has established a leading position in the industry through the strategy of "parallel development of physical recycling and chemical recycling".

The physical recycling of waste plastic by Vary Tech has experienced a transformation from single recycling to a full industrial chain closed loop. In 2009, the company entered a standardized initial stage, taking the disassembly of waste home appliances as the breakthrough point, and establishing a standardized technical service system and operation platform. In 2015, the company stepped into the intelligent integration stage, constructing a "two-network integration" waste material recycling system, achieving efficient recycling of waste plastic and improving resource utilization efficiency. Since 2018, the company has entered the high-value recycling stage, building a high-value plastic utilization platform and becoming the only waste plastic comprehensive utilization enterprise in Hunan Province to be included in the regulations that year. In 2022, PCR high-value recycled plastic achieved large-scale production. In 2024, it innovatively built a "digital intelligent trusted traceability management and control system". In 2025, it promoted the deep integration of the traceability system with artificial intelligence (AI), committed to real-time monitoring, intelligent management, and full-life-cycle digital traceability of the whole process of waste home appliance plastic recycling and regeneration, ensuring that every grain of recycled plastic is "traceable", and rejecting "greenwashing" and false recycling.





However, traditional physical recycling is unable to cope with mixed and contaminated low-value waste plastic, while incineration and landfilling not only cause huge waste of resources but also bring the risk of secondary pollution. Among many treatment methods, pyrolysis technology is currently a resource-based and harmless integrated solution that takes into account wide applicability, process maturity, and carbon reduction advantages, becoming the strategic choice of Vary Tech.



Among many pyrolysis technology routes, Vary Tech has chosen the rotary kiln scheme, which shows better cost performance due to its wide raw material applicability, mature and stable continuous operation capability, and medium to low investment threshold. Specifically, the rotary kiln has strong applicability to mixed, block, and high-moisture raw materials; at the same time, its structure is mature, the technology is stable and reliable, and it can ensure continuous and stable production. Compared with other pyrolysis technology routes, the rotary kiln has obvious advantages in controlling investment costs.

The chemical recycling of waste plastic by Vary Tech takes pyrolysis technology as the core. In terms of environmental friendliness, the pyrolysis working temperature is much lower than the incineration temperature, and the overall energy consumption is only about 15% of that of incineration; the oxygen-free pyrolysis process suppresses the generation of dioxins from the source, and the flue gas emission is only 1/10 of that of incineration; the fully enclosed system ensures that pollutants do not leak, and the emission factors are far lower than the national standards.

In terms of resource value, pyrolysis can efficiently convert common waste plastics such as PE, PP, PS, ABS, and composite waste plastics into pyrolysis oil, combustible gas, and pyrolytic carbon, realizing the complete resource utilization of "three products of oil, gas, and carbon"; pyrolytic oil can be directly sold or modified and refined into gasoline, diesel, or deep-processed into chemicals such as olefins, pyrolytic carbon can be used as building materials or fuel, or deep-processed into carbon black; pyrolytic gas can not only be used for thermal energy in the pyrolysis system but also as raw materials for producing green hydrogen and green alcohol.

In terms of technical maturity and adaptability, pyrolysis can process various mixed and contaminated low-value waste plastics, with strong adaptability; the technology has been industrially applied and successfully "gone global"; it can realize 7×24-hour continuous and stable operation, and the daily processing capacity of a single unit can reach up to 150 tons.



To overcome the three major industry pain points of pyrolysis technology, namely "high-temperature sealing", "anti-coking", and "low thermal efficiency", Vary Tech has successfully independently developed and formed 12 core technologies such as combined flexible sealing, anti-coking, and thermal energy cascade recovery, which not only realize the continuous and stable operation of the equipment but also greatly reduce energy consumption. Based on the 6th generation pyrolysis technology, the developed equipment has reduced energy consumption by 60% and increased production capacity by 400% compared with the 3rd generation.


 
In 2019, Vary Tech built the "China's first industrialization project for the chemical recycling of domestic waste plastics", which has been running stably for 5 years, has processed about 1.1 million tons of domestic waste, and realized the chemical recycling of about 110,000 tons of domestic waste plastics. In 2023, Vary Tech's pyrolysis technology and equipment will successfully "go to sea" in South Korea, and the electromagnetic pyrolysis reactor will be applied to waste plastic and tire treatment projects. In 2025, Vary Tech's waste plastic chemical recycling technology and equipment won the industry's high-value recycling technology excellence award.

The application of technology is more than that. The pyrolysis technology of Vary Tech has also been successfully expanded to the development of biochar-based materials, cooperating with a Brazilian Fortune 500 company to promote green metallurgy technology innovation, and becoming the only member of the International Biomass Torrefaction and Carbonisation Council (IBTC) in China.



From plastic to oil is only the beginning of the chemical cycle of waste plastics, and the ultimate goal of Vary Tech is to open up the "closed loop of chemical cycle" from waste plastics to new materials.

There are two main technical paths for the “pyrolysis oil” obtained by oxygen-free pyrolysis of waste plastics to achieve their value transformation and recycling goals. The first path is to improve the quality and upgrade to fuel. Through pretreatment, distillation and hydrofining processes, pyrolysis oil is converted into high-value oils such as gasoline and diesel. This path can also be used proactively to produce sustainable aviation fuel (SAF). The second path is to recycle it into new plastics. Through catalytic cracking technology, pyrolysis oil is directly reduced to ethylene, propylene and other chemical monomers. These monomers can be used to manufacture brand new plastic products, thus achieving the ultimate closed loop of “from waste plastic to new plastic” in the true sense.

As a core working group member of the Chemical Recycling Project of the China Petroleum and Chemical Industry Federation, Vary Tech is working side by side with international chemical giants such as BASF, Dow, Shell, and ExxonMobil to promote the development of the global waste plastic chemical recycling industry.

With the in-depth promotion of global plastic pollution governance and the "double carbon" goal, pyrolysis technology has become a key direction to achieve high-value utilization of waste plastic and promote carbon emission reduction. From physical recycling to chemical circulation, from "white pollution" to "urban oil field", Vary Tech is relying on its deep technical accumulation and forward-looking strategic layout to turn the closed-loop future of low-value waste plastic from a blueprint into reality, and make unremitting efforts to build a sustainable world of "harmony with all things and tolerance with heaven and earth".

 
 

Copyright 2021©by Vary Technology All Rights Reserved Xiang ICP Bei No. 12008747 ConmandWebsite construction