Given the complexity of solving both the climate and the plastics waste issues, both of central importance to the chemical industry, we are very much of the view that you should try everything. No single technology or pathway is likely to be the answer and different solutions may have different levels of attraction in different geographies. In our ESG and Climate weekly report yesterday, we spent time talking about recycling and how the business might logically develop and we talked about where blue and green methanol might fit.
Our ideal recycling operation is shown in the picture below:
Separately, the Monolith headline highlighted in today's daily report is worth some discussion. This is a new technology to make carbon black (from methane), but which essentially only makes hydrogen and carbon. The traditional process involves heating the methane or oil using furnace-based heat and the carbon black players on the US Gulf have a combined CO2 footprint of almost 3 million tons per annum based on 2019 EPA data. To get its green (turquoise) credentials, monolith needs renewable power – to feed plasma jet heating technology (so a lot of renewable power) and ideally a source of renewable natural gas. Even if Monolith uses regular natural gas the carbon footprint per ton of carbon black would be negligible and the by-product hydrogen would be valuable – it would technically be “blue” rather than turquoise hydrogen unless the company was using renewable natural gas and even then it might struggle to get a green label, as the carbon is essentially being captured as carbon black.
While this is an interesting technology Monolith becomes another project or series of projects that require reasonably priced renewable power – some of that could be generated from the hydrogen stream coming from the process, although depending on location, the hydrogen may have a higher value. Monolith also needs renewable natural gas and sources are limited, while interest in getting access to the gas is high. It is an interesting technology, but the power needs are high – the company claims that its planned (1 billion dollars) expansion will need 2 million megawatt-hours of renewable power per annum.
Working in Monolith’s favor is the fact that the auto industry seems very keen on improving the sustainability (carbon footprint) of its products and they might pay more for tires that have a carbon-free carbon black versus those that do not.