Mechanical vs. Chemical Recycling
What each process does to the polymer, why only one of them creates a market for reactive additives, and which European rules are still unwritten.
Mechanical recycling melts plastic and reshapes it. Chemical recycling takes it apart into smaller molecules and builds new polymer from them. The difference matters commercially because the two have different costs, different limits, and, in European law, different regulatory status. It matters to a Nexam Chemical shareholder because reactive additives sell into one of them and not the other.
The short version
| Mechanical recycling | Chemical recycling | |
|---|---|---|
| What happens to the polymer | Melted and reformed, chains stay as they are, shorter each pass | Broken down to monomers or feedstock, then repolymerized |
| Typical input | Sorted, relatively clean single-polymer streams | Mixed, colored or contaminated streams that mechanical lines reject |
| Output quality | Depends on input and on how many lives the material has had | In principle equal to virgin, since the polymer is rebuilt |
| Energy and cost | Lower | Higher |
| Where additives help | Yes: restoring processability of the degraded polymer | No: the polymer is remade from scratch |
Why mechanical recycling degrades material
Every melt cycle shortens polymer chains. Shear breaks them, heat and oxygen break them, and moisture breaks the ones in polyesters. Contamination from other polymers and from labels and adhesives widens the distribution and seeds defects. The visible consequences depend on the process, but in most of them what fails first is melt strength rather than any number on a specification sheet. That is the whole premise of the reactive additive business: the material is chemically fine, and rheologically not.
Why chemical recycling is not simply better
It costs more energy and more money, and its capacity is small next to mechanical recycling. In European law it also sits in an unfinished regulatory frame, which is worth understanding before treating announcements about it as volume.
- For food contact, Regulation (EU) 2022/1616 requires recycled plastic to be made with a suitable technology listed in its Annex I, or with a novel technology developed under its Chapter IV, with authorisation of the individual recycling process where relevant.
- For the packaging mandate, Regulation (EU) 2025/40 leaves the decisive details to acts that are still being written. Article 7(8) requires an implementing act on how recycled content is calculated and verified, and Article 7(9) a delegated act setting sustainability criteria for plastic recycling technologies, both due by 31 December 2026. The Commission lists them as still in preparation.
Until those are adopted, how much of a chemically recycled batch counts toward a target, and under what accounting, is not settled. Any model that converts announced chemical recycling capacity into compliant recycled content is making an assumption the law has not yet made.
Which one is the market for additives
Mechanical. A reactive chain extender works by re-coupling the chain ends that mechanical recycling leaves behind. If a polymer has been depolymerized and rebuilt, there is nothing to repair, and the output competes with virgin resin on its own terms.
This is the frame for reading any announcement in this sector. Growth in chemical recycling capacity is not growth in Nexam Chemical's addressable market. Growth in the recycled content that has to come from mechanical streams is exactly that, and the 2030 minimums are what create it.
Supply, in official numbers
The EU generated 79.7 million tonnes of packaging waste in 2023, of which 15.8 million tonnes was plastic. Plastic packaging recycling has a 55% target for 2030; in 2023 only Belgium at 59.5% and Latvia at 59.2% were above it, and several member states were below 30%. Essentially all of that recycling is mechanical.
Sources
- Commission Regulation (EU) 2022/1616, Articles 3 and 4 and Annex I.
- Regulation (EU) 2025/40, Article 7(8) and 7(9).
- European Commission, PPWR implementation timeline.
- Eurostat, packaging waste statistics, 2023 data.
Independent research, not affiliated with Nexam Chemical and not investment advice.