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Turning Plastic Back Into Oil

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Reverse Engineering To Save The World

The technology exists to turn plastic into oil! Meet the oil conversion machine, developed in Japan.

In a process that uses mainly heat and pressure, the machine takes plastic and in a few hours produces unrefined oil, composed of kerosene, diesel, gasoline and heavy oils. 1 kilogram of plastic converts into 1 liter of oil.

There are several large scale machines like this operating in the US at this time, but as usual, cost is the factor that keeps this technology from expanding quickly to every recycling center and garbage dump.

It is truly thrilling to see the household size converter in this video. Stuff the plastic right in there, and out comes oil! Classified as "light medium", it can be further processed for use in cars, motorbikes, boilers, stoves, generators -- everything!

Akinori Ito of the Blest Corporation, who has taken his invention around the world to developing countries, says:"People begin to see that this is not garbage. This plastic waste, the bottle cap, the lunch container.. is oil. So when a child understands this, the garbage gets cleaned up. People don't know that the garbage is oil. That's why they're throwing it away."

Sitting with a bag of plastic garbage in his lap, he says: "It's an oil field."

The current tabletop model can convert one kilo of plastic into one liter of oil, and can sells from the Blest Corporation for $9,500.

--Bibi Farber

This video was produced by ourworld.unu.edu
Blest Corporation: http://www.blest.co.jp/