Tracing the Path to Sustainability with Recycling Technology

Q: What are the main inhibitors to transitioning to a circular economy?
A: The main inhibitors are the lack of knowledge and information that provides certainty about traceability throughout the value chain to ensure the use of recycled materials. Achieving circularity in post-consumer flexible plastic packaging, including items like potato chip or cookie packs, plastic bags and baby food pouches, is challenging due to their complex composition. To add value to this category, awareness must be generated regarding its true worth, thus creating a market for it. Once post-consumer flexible plastic waste gains value, people are incentivized to return it, reintegrating it into the circular economy.

Q: What technologies does the company use in its recycling processes, and what is the Eco2veritas certification?
A: Greenback continuously integrates technological advances, including blockchain, photos, videos, the Internet of Things (IoT) and artificial intelligence (AI). The company possesses eco2Veritas technology, a traceability digital tool that collects key data, such as the origins and amounts of the processed material. It delivers a certification for the neutralized waste and proof of origin and circularity for the output materials incorporated back into the economy.

Q: What characterizes Greenback's process/technology?
A: The process to produce pyrolytic oil from post-consumer flexible plastic is carried out through a patented technology developed in the UK by Carlos Ludlow-Palafox, a Mexican engineer. This pyrolysis process, induced by microwaves, allows for a broader range of materials to be used compared to other pyrolysis technologies. By combining industrial and technological aspects, Greenback provides full traceability and transparency in the entire recycling sector, setting the standard.

Q: What is the environmental impact of your recycling method, and how do you mitigate that impact?
A: While any human activity has an impact, Greenback's life cycle analysis is positive. The company's carbon footprint is negative when recovering plastics and aluminum from laminated materials containing aluminum foil, like tuna or wet pet food packaging. Greenback's solution effectively mitigates environmental impact in several ways: removing large amounts of post-consumer flexible plastics from landfills, generating low emissions through an advanced heat convection process, minimizing water usage with a closed-cooled circuit for machines and utilizing 25% of the gas produced by the pyrolysis process to cover energy needs. Additionally, Greenback recovers aluminum from some packaging, further reducing the carbon footprint.

Q: What type of plastics do you collect, and how do you process them?
A: Greenback receives plastic from suppliers through purchase agreements, collecting materials such as Polyethylene, Polypropylene, multilayer packaging, Pet food sachets, LDPE, HDPE Films, BOPP Wrappings (chip bags), snack and candies packets, meat and cheese wraps (laminates PE w/EVOH), Pouches (Drinks, Tuna, etc.). The collected materials are dried and crushed to feed the reactor, where pyrolysis by microwave induction breaks them down molecularly, converting them into gas. Approximately 70% of this gas is cooled to become pyrolytic oil, while the rest powers the entire process.

Q: Besides environmental benefits, what is the social impact when opening a new Greenback recycling plant?
A: Opening a new Greenback recycling plant has significant social impacts, as it creates new sources of income for garbage collectors and sorters by giving value to post-consumer flexible plastic waste. The company's digital platform ensures objective payments based on material quality, free from biases and discrimination based on gender or ethnicity. Moreover, Greenback offers technical training to those employed, benefiting the community by providing well-paid jobs and opportunities for career growth. By bringing the solution directly to areas with waste accumulation, Greenback also saves on logistics costs and fosters a circular economy that benefits local communities.

Q: How did the Nestlé partnership help the company open its first plant in Mexico?
A: Nestlé, as a leading brand in the food industry with a goal to recycle 40% of its packaging by 2030, provided soft financing under favorable conditions, aiding Greenback in opening its first plant in Mexico. Even before the plant's installation, Nestlé signed a contract to promote circularity in its flexible packaging in Mexico. The collaboration enables Greenback to generate neutralization certificates through the Eco2veritas platform's valuable data. By processing and validating the materials, Greenback provides Nestlé with neutralization certificates for a specific tonnage, which they can offset against their waste.

Q: What other potential partners has Greenback identified in Mexico?
A: Alongside Nestlé, other prominent consumer products companies have expressed interest in participating in Greenback's innovative recycling solution. The international organization Alliance to End Plastic Waste supports Greenback with financing for its second module in the Cuautla plant. Additionally, Greenback collaborates with the nonprofit organization Ecoce, which has extensive experience in PET recycling but faced challenges with flexible packaging recycling. The new management of Ecoce provides valuable support to the Flexible Packaging Committee, benefiting both organizations.

Q: What are the company's plans for the middle and long term?
A: Greenback's vision is to make an immediate impact on a cleaner, safer and more circular world. To achieve this, the company has ambitious plans to expand its operations in Mexico, Latin America and other regions facing similar waste challenges. Greenback has already signed projects in the UK and is finalizing projects in Malaysia and Germany. Further projects are under discussion in Brazil, Colombia, Guatemala, the Dominican Republic, the US and Canada.

In May 2023, we proudly inaugurated our first advanced recycling plant in Mexico. Looking ahead, our ambitious plan includes the establishment of up to 40 plants throughout the country in various regions by 2026. Our vision extends beyond boundaries, as waste knows no limits. Wherever landfills exist, we envision the possibility of setting up a new plant, furthering our commitment to a cleaner and more sustainable future. 


Greenback is a UK-based company is green solutions company. Greenback has pioneered the first industrial, fully circular value chain for flexible post-consumer packaging. Through its advanced recycling process, it produces recycled food-grade Pyrolytic oil, used by the petrochemical industry to create new recycled content packaging for the consumer products sector. Greenback is committed to supporting the UN Sustainable Development Goals by reducing post-consumer flexible plastic waste. The company's Cuautla plant in Mexico stands as the first recycling plant capable of recycling post-consumer flexible packaging in Latin America.