Energy & Utilities

A new joint venture between Clean Planet Energy and Crossroads Real Estate aims to tackle the plastic waste crisis, with the potential for over £400 million of new UK investment deployed for future facilities

On 15th November, Clean Planet Energy announced a new joint venture with private equity firm Crossroads Real Estate to fund Clean Planet Energy’s flagship ecoPlant, which is currently under construction in Teesside, Northeast England. This will be the first of 10 new ecoPlants that Crossroads Real Estate and Clean Planet Energy are jointly seeking to build and operate across the UK.

The new joint venture could see over £400 million of new UK investment

deployed for the future construction of these facilities to tackle the plastic waste crisis. Potential sites have already been identified in Lincolnshire, Gloucestershire, Lancashire and South Wales, with further locations and announcements to be made in the months ahead.

Clean Planet Energy’s ecoPlant is a green, advanced recycling facility intended to process non-recyclable and hard-to-recycle waste plastics that would otherwise be sent to

David Gillerman, CEO, Crossroads Real Estate landfill. Each ecoPlant is designed to accept 20,000 tonnes of plastics each year and to convert this waste into (a) ultra-low sulphur fuels to replace fossil fuels in the transport and heavy-machinery sectors, and (b) petrochemical feedstocks, including naphtha, which can be used to make new plastic products without the need to use fossil-based feedstocks. Clean Planet Energy’s ultra-lowsulphur diesel can reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 75 percent

Bertie Stephens, Group CEO, Clean Planet Energy Teesside plant

compared to the use of traditional diesel, while the joint venture could also lead to over 200,000 tonnes of hard-to-recycle waste plastics being repurposed for use in the circular supply chain each year.

“At Crossroads, we are committed to green opportunities and impact investing as demonstrated already through our sustainable hotels strategy. We look forward to partnering with Clean Planet Energy to roll out ecoPlants across the UK, including the flagship ecoPlant already under construction in Teesside,” says Founding Partner and CEO of Crossroads Real Estate, David Gillerman.

“The negative impact of plastic waste on our environment, plus the challenges we face from excess carbon emissions, made the joint venture with Clean Planet Energy a very compelling opportunity. With this investment, we have the ability to make a significant environmental and social impact across the UK,” he continues.

The news comes as COP27 is currently underway and world leaders are seeking solutions to reduce global GHG emissions and plastic pollution.

Data from 2021 shows that the UK still generates over two million tonnes of plastic waste each year, with well over 60 percent of this not suitable for recycling. In November 2022, the UK government’s Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (EFRA) Committee published a report focusing on accelerating the reduction of plastic waste, with advanced recycling identified as a key policy recommendation. By developing new ecoPlants throughout the UK, Clean Planet Energy and Crossroads Real Estate are opening a route for traditionally non-recyclable plastic waste to be repurposed into

Proposed UK ecoPlant locations

sustainable and circular economy products; thereby cutting plastic pollution, reducing the amount of waste entering UK landfill, and also lowering GHG emissions when the waste is converted into ultra-lowsulphur diesel and used as a lowcarbon fuel replacement.

Bertie Stephens, Group CEO of Clean Planet Energy, says, “Clean Planet Energy’s mission is to remove over one million tonnes of nonrecyclable plastic waste from our environment, every year. This exciting partnership gives us the capacity to make a significant dent in this target. Having Crossroads Real Estate join us, not just for the development of potentially 10 new UK ecoPlant projects but also for the construction of the current Teesside ecoPlant, means in Crossroads we have a partner who, like us, is focussed on making a sustainable difference with its investments, delivering on a vision of a greener UK and beyond. We’re now reaching out to local councils and private partners across the UK who could benefit from a reduction in plastic waste entering their landfill.”

Earlier this year, Clean Planet Energy announced a 10-year agreement with global energy company bp plc to offtake its circular products from its ecoPlants into the market. Each new ecoPlant will be able to process hard-to-recycle plastics in the UK; at their peak, the facilities should create over 750 direct new jobs, and potentially thousands of indirect jobs when the ecoPlants move from development into the construction and operation phases.

Henri Beranek

Creating a regenerative world by carbonising biomass residues and supplying CO2 negative materials for the construction industry, carbonauten is the German start-up calling time on CO2

Nominated for the Innovation Award at the bauma 2022 construction trade fair, carbonauten is blazing a carbon negative trail throughout industries. 2022 will see the start-up launch its first minus CO2 factory, with the potential to bind 12,000 tons of CO2 a year. Aiming to operate at least 100 such factories by 2030, we speak with Henri Beranek from carbonauten’s Corporate Communications team to learn more.

Communications (HB): carbonauten is a German start-up that aims to launch its first “Minus CO2 Factory 001” in 2022. The company’s goal is to work with nature to capture large quantities of climate gases and store them in a new category of materials - carbonauten NET Materials®.

Torsten Becker, Founder, “dreamer” and CEO, has a clear mission: he wants people to buy organic and healthy food because it is cheaper than conventional food, to live in sustainable buildings because they are better and cheaper, and to consume products that strengthen our ecosystem because they are in turn better and cheaper than conventional ones. Sustainability must not remain a luxury. The carbonauten system makes this possible.

HB: The goal of our five business units is to make decarbonisation practical. The results are high-quality, low-cost, biocarbon enriched plastic granules, building materials and agricultural inputs. The amazing thing about carbonauten NET Materials® is that they not only have better properties but have an impact far beyond the simple understanding of sustainability. They don’t just prevent further damage to

our social and ecological systems, but actively contribute to their regeneration.

CO2 sinks are created by charring woody biomass residues into engineered biocarbons. This method prevents the biomass from rotting and the carbon and other climate gases stored through photosynthesis from re-entering the atmosphere. The reason for this is that technical biocarbons do not metabolise and are therefore stable for several thousand years. As a result, one ton of biocarbon permanently stores up to 3.3 tons of CO2. In combination with various binders, technical biocarbons turn into the CO2-storing carbonauten NET Materials®.

HB: The decarbonisation effects of the carbonauten system are based on three pillars. Firstly, the recycling of biomass residues. By not rotting or burning woody waste, but carbonising it without oxygen, high-quality technical biocarbons can be obtained while the emergence of climate gases is prevented.

As the carbonisation process is exotherm, renewable energy is produced in large quantities. The smallest possible plant already provides 24 gigawatt hours (GWh) of renewable thermal energy that can be supplied to industry. This expands the spectrum of renewable energies and makes fossil fuels increasingly obsolete.

The third approach is based on carbonauten NET Materials® – high quality and cost-efficient materials for a wide range of industries. As the CO2-storing, technical biocarbons are incorporated in them, they replace fossil raw materials in large quantities. As they were developed to substitute conventional materials, the production facilities of the industrial partners do not have to be reconfigured. This allows fast industrial decarbonisation through a simple choice of material.

HB: In addition to mineral building materials or wood, we also find large quantities of plastics in buildings. Enriched with 30 – 80 percent technical biocarbons, they offer enormous potential in the fight against the climate crisis. On the one hand, they can save massive amounts of fossil raw materials, and on the other, the recycled plastic, which is still scarce, can be used for other products. Windows, pipes, hoses, insulation materials and wall panels thus become CO2 sinks. In addition, properties such as hardness, stability, and weight improve, and they avoid industrial soot.

The most important thing, however, is the price. Since carbonauten extracts the technical biocarbons from waste and also uses the resulting energy for its own production facilities, it can charge favourable prices without cross-subsidisation by the CO2 certificates that are also generated.

carbonauten’s regenerative process allows residual materials to become raw materials and recyclables

– CARBONAUTEN

Christoph Hiemer, co-Founder, explains the carbonauten system

HB: The carbonauten “Minus CO2 Factory 001” in Eberswalde will start production this year. Three further sites in Germany are scheduled to go into operation in 2023. From then on, international scaling will begin. By 2030, at least 100 minus CO2 factories are to bind, store and avoid several gigatons of climate gases. Another goal is to work with partners to ensure that organic quality becomes cheap and accessible to everyone. Our motto: f*ck CO2 - if not now, when?