INEOS Styrolution Achieves Milestone with Inaugural Commercial Shipment of Recycled Styrene Monomer from Indaver

INEOS Styrolution has reached a major milestone with the successful receipt of its first commercial delivery of recycled styrene monomer (SM), marking a pivotal step toward advancing circular economy practices in the styrenics industry. The initial truckloads of recycled SM, supplied by Indaver, arrived at INEOS Styrolution’s Antwerp site. The feedstock comes from Indaver’s newly inaugurated depolymerisation plant in Antwerp, officially opened on September 25, 2025. As Europe’s first facility dedicated solely to polystyrene recycling, the plant underscores the potential of local, closed-loop supply chains that minimize transportation needs and reduce environmental impacts.

This first commercial-scale delivery of recycled styrene monomer in Europe opens the door for producing high-quality polystyrene and a wide range of styrenics. The applications span across food-grade materials, transparent packaging, and medical components, demonstrating that recycled materials can maintain the same quality and safety standards as virgin feedstock. This achievement strengthens INEOS Styrolution’s sustainable product portfolio, which already includes mechanically recycled and bio-attributed styrenics, and reflects the company’s commitment to advancing multiple recycling technologies to address diverse waste streams.

Commenting on this achievement, Rob Buntinx, President EMEA at INEOS Styrolution, emphasized the company’s readiness to serve the market with large-scale, depolymerisation-based styrenics. He noted that customers now gain access to additional sustainable solutions that reduce environmental footprints without compromising on either performance or product quality.

Indaver also highlighted its role in driving innovation in circularity. Erik Moerman, Sales and Development Director of Indaver’s Plastics2Chemicals (P2C) division, pointed out that the company is pioneering advanced chemical recycling. By transforming difficult-to-recycle plastics into virgin-quality feedstock like styrene, Indaver is providing a renewable alternative to fossil resources. He added that the firm’s proprietary technology, backed by strong partnerships and continuous R&D, delivers high-purity recycled materials suitable even for demanding applications such as food packaging, underscoring that performance and sustainability can coexist seamlessly.

This breakthrough highlights a unique property of polystyrene: its ability to be fully broken down to its original monomer and then reconstructed for high-value use. Unlike many other plastics, polystyrene’s recyclability through depolymerisation ensures it can retain both material quality and safety. Furthermore, depolymerisation is more energy-efficient compared to other advanced recycling technologies such as pyrolysis, offering a lower-energy pathway to achieving circularity.

By keeping polystyrene in circulation and converting waste into valuable feedstock, INEOS Styrolution and Indaver demonstrate how collaboration and innovation can deliver scalable solutions to global plastic waste challenges. This milestone not only reinforces the role of chemical recycling in sustainable material use but also sets a precedent for the broader plastics industry to adopt similar strategies, ensuring waste is viewed as a resource rather than a burden.