Chemical recycling research focuses on advanced technologies that break down complex plastic waste into its basic molecular building blocks or secondary feedstocks for refineries. The main goal is to optimise these processes for commercial viability, enabling a true circular economy by turning contaminated, difficult-to-recycle waste plastics back into virgin-quality raw materials.

Current fuel research is shifting from conventional fossil feedstocks to sustainable alternatives, including advanced biofuels, synthetic e-fuels, and waste-derived pyrolysis oils. Scientific efforts are heavily concentrated on the rigorous molecular characterization and thermochemical upgrading of these complex mixtures to optimize their energy density, combustion kinetics, and storage stability. The overarching objective is to enable the seamless integration of these low-carbon alternatives into existing infrastructure while significantly mitigating global greenhouse gas emissions.

All the technology research we are working on deals with real-world samples, which are usually highly complex, mostly hydrocarbon-based oils containing thousands of isomers and many trace contaminants that can affect progress.

Comprehensive analytics, including reliable identification and, in particular, quantification of individual analytes and groups, is therefore key to advances in other topics related to RECYCLING and FUELS.

We focus on developing, optimising, and validating analytical methods to accurately characterise the chemical composition of complex samples, such as alternative fuels, oils from thermochemical processes like pyrolysis and HTL, and products of refining.