Novoloop & Aether achieve continuous operations of plastic waste to adipic acid pilot plant

Novoloop, a Menlo Park (California) based plastic circular economy technology company, has announced the successful start-up of its pilot plant built with Aether Industries, a publicly-listed specialty chemicals manufacturer, at the latter’s site in Surat.

Construction of the pilot plant was completed in March 2024, and it has now passed equipment testing and solvent runs, and has achieved continuous operations with the usage of commercially-representative waste feedstock.

“This milestone marks the successful transition from batch reactions to an integrated and automated plant that validates Novoloop’s first-of-a-kind Lifecycling technology,” a statement from the two companies said.

Novoloop’s process transforms post-consumer polyethylene plastic waste into virgin-quality adipic acid at a carbon footprint reduction of up to 91%, compared to the conventional process of producing adipic acid.

“After years of research, development, and engineering, we have built a radically innovative process and now our pilot plant is successfully demonstrating this paradigm shift in technology. We are tremendously excited about this next chapter, where we make available the first lots of Lifecycled products to the world,” said Miranda Wang, Co-founder and CEO of Novoloop.

The primary objectives of the pilot plant are to demonstrate the safe and reliable operations of the integrated process; validate key equipment performance in an industrial environment; and achieve production of high purity products. The facility also provides a platform for training personnel and developing protocols for commercial operations. The plant will produce tonne-scale samples to enable off-take commitments with early customers.

“Having built the pilot plant in less than six months, from detailed engineering to commissioning, the project demonstrates remarkable efficiency and collaboration between the teams,” said Dr. Aman Desai, Director and Senior VP of Research, Manufacturing, and Operations at Aether.

Novoloop plans to expand the pilot capacity to the full 70-tpa (tonnes per annum) demonstration plant scale are already underway.