The Dawn of the Waste Plastic Oil Conversion Equipment - The Croquis Process and the Embryonic Move Toward a Recycling Society in 1998 (September 1998)

The Dawn of the Waste Plastic Oil Conversion Equipment - The Croquis Process and the Embryonic Move Toward a Recycling Society in 1998 (September 1998)

At the end of the 1990s, Japan was in the midst of a transition to a "recycling-oriented society": the Kyoto Protocol was adopted in 1997, and the following year the Containers and Packaging Recycling Law was fully enforced, making the recycling of waste plastics a legal obligation. The "oil conversion technology," which converts waste plastic into hydrocarbon oil through thermal decomposition, attracted attention. The "Kuroki Process" developed by Nippo Sangyo of Suita City, Osaka Prefecture, was a typical example. The high-temperature reaction using a screw structure achieved a yield of over 97% and a byproduct of less than 1%, and the processing cost was competitive at 18 to 30 yen/kg. Such technology was sought to be implemented as a regional recycling business, not by a single company, but by multiple industrial waste treatment companies sharing and operating the equipment in a cooperative manner. At the same time, a national research institute also succeeded in converti
ng thermosetting resin into oil through liquid-phase decomposition, opening the way for the utilization of unused resources. This movement was at the crossroads of institutional, technological, and regional collaboration.