Evaluating the Environmental Sustainability of Alternative Ways to Produce Benzene, Toluene, and Xylene

The petrochemical industry can reduce its environmental impacts by moving from fossil resources to alternative carbon feedstocks. Biomass and plastic waste-based production pathways have recently been developed for benzene, toluene, and xylene (BTX). This study evaluates the environmental impacts of these novel BTX pathways at a commercial and future (2050) scale, combining traditional life cycle assessment with absolute environmental sustainability assessment using the planetary boundary concept. We show that plastic waste-based BTX has lower environmental impacts than fossil BTX, including a 12% decrease in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Biomass-based BTX shows greater GHG emission reductions (42%), but it causes increased freshwater consumption and eutrophication. Toward 2050, GHG emission reductions become 75 and 107% for plastic waste and biobased production, respectively, compared to current fossil-BTX production. When comparing alternative uses of plastic waste, BTX production has larger climate benefits than waste incineration with energy recovery with a GHG benefit of 1.1 kg CO2-equiv/kg plastic waste. For biomass (glycerol)-based BTX production, other uses of glycerol are favorable over BTX production. While alternative BTX production pathways can decrease environmental impacts, they still transgress multiple planetary boundaries. Further impact reduction efforts are thus required, such as using other types of (waste) biomass, increasing carbon recycling, and abatement of end-of-life emissions.