Experts scoff but Joost believes he can make oil from dirty plastic

Inside the old jam factory in Monbulk, just down the road from his organic farm, environmentalist Joost Bakker has built what he hopes could be part of the solution to Australia’s recycling crisis.

The pyrolisis plant at Monbulk.

It’s a multimillion-dollar pyrolysis plant, funded by local investors. Mr Bakker believes it is the first plant of its type in Australia.

You put contaminated plastic waste in one end, cook it at about 200 degrees and collect the crude oil that comes out the other end. The oil can then be refined and used as petrol.

“The only other thing you end up with is carbon. The carbon can go into steel, it can go into tyres, or ink,” says Mr Bakker. “There is no waste.”

Read the story form The Age by Laim Mannix - “Experts scoff but Joost believes he can make oil from dirty plastic.”