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We use advanced manufacturing systems to create a scalable alternative to construction softwood from unrecyclable plastic waste.
About
The founders of Circular11 met on a waste-management in Nepal, where the damage caused by plastic incineration was part of the air we breathed. Our goal is to make mixed waste plastic a critical resource in the material economy of the 21st century, and in doing so, eliminate the need for the dirty disposal of plastic.
We’re developing an advanced process control system that enables plastic manufacturers to process mixed, variable input streams into stable, high-quality products. We’re using this to make waste-based composites the default material in the £80bn outdoor timber market. We’re using our operations to develop this APC system into a technology platform that can transform the supply chains of the 25,000 plastic extrusion facilities worldwide.
Key Benefits
We use our system to create a plastic lumber product that can be used instead of timber in outdoor applications.
Our material lasts 3-5x longer than timber equivalents, and does not need maintenance, whilst almost matching the affordability of softwood timber.
Our products carry a number of other benefits that competitors don’t have:
- Verified carbon negative material: our products divert significantly more carbon dioxide than is used in their production (0.54 tonnes CO2e diverted per tonne of product).
- Will be collected and recycled at the end of its life (conditional on minimum volumes for pick up being met).
- Meets international structural-grade lumber standard, unlike any other UK-based lumber company.
Applications
We’re in the segment for outdoor infrastructure – generally competing with treated timber in categories UC3, UC4, and UC5. We exclude structural joists, along with pallet and scaffolding boards. Our markets are therefore broken down into the following sectors, with consumption of sectors given in million metres cubed and estimated price from the point of sale at the sawmill factory.
o Fencing: 1.3 Mm3, around £400m
o Landscaping (UC4 environments): - Sleepers, bollards, edging, planters, benches, decking accessories. 0.3–0.5 Mm3 – around £150m
o Street furniture & amenity products - Benches, picnic tables. (0.2 Mm3) - £80m
o Marine & coastal landscaping (UC5) - Groynes, pontoons, jetties, dock edging (0.1 Mm) - £40m
o Decking (substructure) – 0.25 Mm3 - £70m
o Railway sleepers (0.25–0.35 Mm3), - £100m