4 February, 2025 16:59:22 IST 
PolyCycl, a Haryana based technology startup, has launched a patented chemical recycling technology to tackle pollution problems caused by single-use plastic products.
This fully indigenous innovation, developed over a decade, enables the conversion of single-use and hard-to-recycle plastics into food-grade polymers, renewable chemicals, and sustainable fuels, according to the company.
PolyCycl’s technology combines its patented ContiFlow Cracker Generation VI - a fully continuous thermo-chemical pyrolysis process - with PyOilClean refining technology. The process breaks down waste plastics into liquified hydrocarbon oils, which are further purified to remove contaminants. The resulting chemical feedstocks can be used by petrochemical and hydrocarbon industries to produce new low-carbon materials, including circular polymers.
The Generation VI technology is protected by multiple international patents.
Mr. Amit Tandon, Founder and CEO, PolyCycl said, India generates over 10 million tonnes of plastic waste annually, with over 40 percent of this being single-use plastics such as grocery bags and flexible packaging. Traditional recycling methods struggle to handle this waste, which often ends up clogging drains, littering streets, or polluting waterways, he said.
PolyCycl’s technology thermally breaks down thin plastics to their molecular building blocks (oligomers), which can then be re-constituted to create new virgin-quality materials, he said.
The technology delivers high conversion yields of 65-75 percent and generates chemical feedstocks that have been qualified for the circular economy by multiple petrochemical companies globally, he added.
The technology’s patented fully-continuous process architecture provides ease-of-scale and development of modular lines each capable of processing between 15 and 100 tonnes per day per line of plastics. The patented design offers significant cost efficiencies, with capital costs up to one-half to one-fourth of competitive technologies in Europe and the US, while delivering projects EBITDA exceeding 50 percent, the company said in a press statement.
India’s Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) rules mandate 10% recycled content in flexible packaging and 30% in rigid plastic packaging by 2025-26. “PolyCycl’s technology supports these targets, enabling production of recycled virgin polymers that meet stringent requirements for contact-sensitive applications, including for food and pharmaceutical packaging,” the statement added.
