Plastics recycling startup MacroCycle announced a new deal with Meta on Tuesday that will help speed the development of its first commercial plant.
Three-year-old MacroCycle, based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, has developed a novel way to process plastic waste that strips it of contaminants, making the resulting recycled material more attractive to customers. The startup says its technology generates 80% fewer carbon emissions than new, non-recycled virgin PET plastic (a common type of plastic used in bottles, containers and textiles). MacroCycle was a Top 20 finalist in the 2025 Startup Battlefield competition at TechCrunch Disrupt in San Francisco.
Under the terms of the agreement, Meta will pay MacroCycle for the rights to those avoided emissions, which lets Meta count the reduction toward its own carbon footprint, which is growing dramatically as a result of the AI boom. A Meta spokesperson confirmed that this is the first such deal the company has signed. MacroCycle gave TechCrunch an exclusive preview of the news.
Payments for what are known as environmental attribute credits (EACs) will provide MacroCycle with a revenue stream that can help support the construction of the new plant, which will be built in the U.S.
Meta’s interest goes beyond the credits themselves. It hopes to help create a market for low-carbon materials like plastics, which are used in its supply chain for things like packaging and hardware. As that market grows, broader access to those materials should help lower the company’s overall carbon footprint.
MacroCycle says its demonstration plant will be capable of producing 5,000 metric tons of recycled plastic per year. The company’s process works by dissolving and purifying PET that’s present in a range of waste streams, including textiles, which have one of the lowest recycling rates of all materials at 0.5%.
The startup’s process loops plastic polymers back on themselves, creating rings called macrocycles, which is where the company gets its name. Solvents wash away contaminants, leaving the macrocycles behind. The loop is then opened, and the polymers can be linked together to form higher-quality plastics. The result is a material that’s indistinguishable from new plastic.
MacroCycle’s use of solvents instead of heat is a major source of its energy savings, which should also result in lower costs, too. The company’s goal is to produce recycled textiles domestically at prices that compete with those from overseas suppliers. The U.S. textile manufacturing industry has been hollowed out over the last 25 years, with employment in the sector down 85%.
MacroCycle is currently working to secure buyers for the material that its first plant will produce. The deal with Meta should make subsequent agreements with other companies easier to obtain, MacroCycle co-founder and CEO Stewart Peña Feliz told TechCrunch. Future plants, he added, will be capable of producing 50,000 metric tons of material per year.
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