Techno‐Economic Comparison of Bio‐Cycling Processes for Mixed Plastic Waste Valorization

Mixed plastic waste is challenging for any recycling process. Here, an enzymatic recycling process is compared with a biotechnological upcycling process for valorizing mixed plastic waste constituted by PLA, PET, and PP. Both process routes are modeled in Aspen Plus, analyzed for bottlenecks, cost drivers, and sensitivity regarding enzymatic and microbial performance. While enzymatic recycling is only viable for uniform plastic feedstock, biotechnological upcycling operating at optimized process conditions reveals the potential to produce carbon‐neutral succinic acid from mixed plastic waste. Biotechnological advances enable the valorization of mixed plastic waste at moderate process conditions. Enzymatic hydrolysis followed by monomer recovery or biotechnological upcycling by fermentation of mixed plastic hydrolysate are compared and analyzed for their economic viability. Thereby cost drivers and potential levers are identified and targets for the future biotechnological research are defined.