The comprehensive report provides an overview on the growth in capacity for these alternative sources of naphtha as chemical industry feedstock, production routes and the need for “upgrading”, key companies and partnerships and the regulatory environment.

Base chemicals are the essential start point for some of the largest volume fossil-based chemical polymers and products used today. Light naphtha is a key feedstock for steam cracking processes to produce olefins and polymers in Europe and Asia. Fossil-based refinery naphthas are converted to reformate for the production of aromatics and polymers. This means that there is an important and urgent need to find renewable carbon-based replacements to meet net-zero goals.

For the defossilization of the chemical industry, it is crucial to find alternatives to fossil-based naphtha. The “alternative naphtha” concept makes use of existing refineries, steam cracking, and chemical industry infrastructure where a proportion of fossil-based feedstocks – crude oil or fossil-based naphthas can be replaced by renewable carbon alternatives derived from the three sources of renewable carbon: CO₂, biomass, and recycling. Possible routes to alternative naphtha are showed in the figure below.