Each year the planet produces hundreds of millions of tonnes of plastic waste, most of which is discarded without recovery. A 2025 study in Nature Communications Earth & Environment reported that the worldwide plastic recycling rate stayed at only 9 percent in 2022, while incineration reached 34 percent and landfilling 40 percent. Researchers at the University of Amsterdam have developed a 25-litre mobile pilot reactor that accepts unsorted mixed plastics and turns them into reusable oil within 30 minutes. The unit will undergo its first field trial in Spain this summer.
The core method, solvothermal liquefaction, places mixed waste inside a sealed vessel together with solvent, heat and pressure. Special nanostructured solid catalysts created by the team speed up the breakdown of polymer bonds and remain reusable. In half an hour the feedstock separates into gas that powers the system, solid char that is removed, and a dark oil. Earlier tests showed the oil possesses an energy value similar to gasoline and contains the original monomers needed for new virgin plastic.
Sorting has long been the main obstacle to higher recycling rates because mechanical methods require clean streams of single resin types. The new process accepts contaminated mixed waste directly. Validation included kinetic experiments, fluid-dynamics simulations and economic modelling that supported scale-up from laboratory to pilot.
The work forms part of the European PLASTICE project, a 20-million-euro EU programme aimed at improving plastic circularity. More than 1.5 million euros supported the Amsterdam group. The technology has reached readiness level 6/7. An engineering partner in India helped build the transportable plant, which includes storage tanks, remote controls and safety systems mounted on modular steel skids.
Initial operation will occur at COGERSA, a municipal waste site in Spain, to test performance on real mixed streams.
