Plastic chemical recycling focuses on recycling

Recently, the problem of plastic pollution has attracted the attention of all walks of life around the world
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In the United States, the American Chemistry Council (ACC) has promoted the chemical recycling of plastics with remarkable results in recent years
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Earlier this year, Kentucky, Mississippi, South Carolina and West Virginia enacted laws to promote chemical recycling of plastic waste
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For 5 years, 18 U.
S.
states have passed laws to promote chemical recycling of plastics
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Some of these states recognize that turning plastic into fuel counts as recycling, raising questions from the public
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The author believes that although the public may not have more relevant knowledge, doubts about the conversion of plastics into fuels are still reasonable
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The focus of plastic chemical recycling should be to establish a complete circular economy system.
Converting plastics into fuels does not conform to the concept of plastic recycling
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U.
S.
environmentalists say they have noticed that most states that have allowed and promoted chemical recycling of plastics to date have explicitly included the conversion of plastics into fuels in their definitions of advanced recycling
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Under legislation enacted in 2019, Iowa, Ohio and Texas already allow plastic chemical recyclers to produce crude oil, diesel, gasoline and home heating oil as well as feedstocks for making plastics
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Environmentalists argue that the regulation allows both the conversion of plastic to plastic and the conversion of plastic to fuel
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This approach may alleviate public concerns about plastic waste, but not reduce the need for new plastic to be used
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And when fuels made of plastic burn, they release harmful air pollutants such as nitrogen oxides and climate-warming carbon dioxide
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Environmentalists generally call for the problem of plastic pollution to be solved by reducing the use of plastics, especially single-use plastics, and gradually abandoning plastic products in life
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The author believes that environmentalists may not understand the breadth and importance of plastics in social life, but their vigilance about plastic recycling is not wrong
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The purpose of chemical cycling is to return the material to the original material to form a closed loop, which cannot be matched by physical cycling
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However, if the plastic is converted into fuel and burned, it can only achieve the purpose of reducing the resources required to manufacture new products and reducing waste, and has no effect on reducing carbon emissions
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In the future, the focus of the plastic chemical recycling industry must be from plastic to plastic to truly form a chemical cycle
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The ACC also clarified that the agency's goal is to tightly regulate plastic chemical recycling, both to protect public health and to align it with other manufacturers' controls
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Chemical recycling of plastics will not involve handling or disposing of waste
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Instead, it involves turning materials into higher-value products for sale, achieving true circularity
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