Stop Burning Forests to Fuel Our Future: Why the World Must Rethink Biofuels and Invest in Plastic-to-Fuel Innovation
By Mathilda D’Silva | Founder & CEO, Ocean Purpose Project, Singapore
From Indonesia's devastating forest and peatland fires to the plastic waste accumulating in our oceans, the global energy transition faces an uncomfortable question: are we solving one environmental crisis by creating another? After years of trying to advance plastic-to-fuel innovation in rooms of mostly boomer Asian gatekeepers who postulate without a quick google search of latest advancements, I believe the world must invest far more seriously in converting non-agricultural waste into useful energy—without sacrificing forests, food security or biodiversity.
The Great “Let Down” and The Uncomfortable Truth about the World's Biofuel Revolution
For decades, the world has been searching for alternatives to fossil fuels. Governments have introduced renewable energy mandates, airlines have pledged to use sustainable aviation fuel, shipping companies are exploring alternative bunkering fuels, and road transport operators are looking for ways to decarbonise.
But behind the promise of a greener fuel economy lies a contradiction.
Some of the crops used to manufacture biofuels are cultivated on land that was once tropical rainforest, peatland or habitat for endangered wildlife.
Palm oil, soybean oil, corn and sugarcane have become important feedstocks for conventional biofuels. While responsibly produced agricultural fuels can deliver benefits, their expansion can also create pressure on land, water, food systems and biodiversity.
In Southeast Asia, these risks are particularly serious.
In the year I took my PSLE exam, the haze was so intense, I remember coughing through my papers. As a 12-year-old I even drew a picture of wearing a bag over my head with a plant as a hat. That was 30 years ago. I’m ashamed to tell that 12 year old me and every 12 year old in my region of South East Asia that nothing has changed but it’s gotten worse.
Indonesia and Malaysia contain some of the world's most ecologically significant tropical forests. Their peatlands store enormous quantities of carbon accumulated over thousands of years. When peatlands are drained through canals, super El Nino warnings from scientists weaponised and forests, small holder farms and indigenous land are burned through together with the humans and wildlife that live in that green, all of ASEAN must hang their head in shame for allowing economic, environmental and social consequences to play out in a crisis that plays itself out on social media scored to Radiohead’s Let down from their 1997 album Ok Computer.
“How do we face each other as Asians sitting in panel discussions in fancy air-conditioned events when our counterparts are looking at yellowed and reddened skies straight out of the Stranger Things scene? We cannot call an energy transition sustainable if producing its fuel contributes to the destruction of the ecosystems that regulate our climate." - Mathilda D’silva
This is why I believe the global conversation about alternative fuels must expand beyond the question of what we can grow to the equally important question of what we already throw away.
Karhutla:
When Land Fires Become a Regional Environmental Crisis
In Indonesia, the term karhutla refers to kebakaran hutan dan lahan—forest and land fires.
These fires are not simply isolated environmental incidents.
They are linked to a complicated combination of land management practices, agricultural expansion, drainage, drought, ignition sources and weak enforcement in some areas where fire does not respect property lines.
A fire originating in a concession, plantation, smallholder plot or degraded landscape can spread into neighbouring forests and peatlands, particularly during prolonged dry conditions.
When peat catches fire, combustion can continue underground, making suppression exceptionally difficult.
The resulting haze can affect Indonesia, Singapore, Malaysia and other neighbouring countries.
For those of us working in ocean conservation, this is not merely an atmospheric problem.
Smoke and airborne pollutants can be deposited onto land and into marine waters. As evident in landmark research conducted by NUS, the 2014 haze did have links to subsequent algae blooms. Changes in nutrient loading, light availability and contaminant exposure may affect coastal ecosystems, although the magnitude depends on the location and characteristics of each fire event. Deforestation also increases erosion and changes hydrological systems, potentially increasing sediment and pollutant transport into rivers and coastal waters.
For me and my staff standing on the shores of our beach office, the intersection of marine pollution, environmental restoration and circular resource recovery is our 9am-6pm. I can see clearly as I look outside my office window why we cannot separate the health of the ocean from the health of the forests, rivers and communities surrounding it. This is not an outsourced job but one that I am physically part of from how the haze impedes our local boat operators from navigation to our bioremediation sites to the worry and weary on our local fish farmers faces who wonder – “wah jiarlat, what’s next?” How the haze affects algae bloom is another article in itself.
It is equally important to be scientifically fair: not every Indonesian forest fire is caused by biofuel production, and not every palm oil plantation supplies a biofuel market. However, demand for agricultural commodities—including biofuel feedstocks—can and most likely has contributed to land-use pressure. That relationship deserves scrutiny from a due diligence and legal perspective and I am puzzled as to it’s relative media silence with the exception of Greenpeace’s work.
The Royal Society's Sustainable Biofuels: Prospects and Challenges warned as early as 2008 that converting carbon-rich landscapes into agricultural production could undermine the greenhouse-gas benefits of biofuels. Nearly two decades later, this warning remains relevant.
The Ethical Problem with Growing Fuel
In 2011, the Nuffield Council on Bioethics published Biofuels: Ethical Issues, raising fundamental questions about food security, land ownership, environmental sustainability and human rights and its principles remain remarkably important.
Biofuels should not compromise people's access to food, water, land or fair employment. They should contribute to genuine reductions in greenhouse-gas emissions, and their benefits should be shared equitably. Carbon credits awarded should be a part of the rigorous due diligence required.
A fuel should be judged by its entire environmental footprint, not simply by the biological origin of its ingredients.
Consider if you will the wider implications of using agricultural land to produce transport fuel. Land that could support food production may instead produce energy crops. Agricultural expansion may increase pressure on forests. Fertilisers and pesticides can affect water quality. Irrigation creates additional demands on freshwater resources. Land-use change may release so much carbon that the resulting fuel takes years—or even decades—to deliver a net climate benefit, if it delivers one at all.
This does not mean all agricultural biofuels are environmentally harmful. Responsibly sourced jelantah or waste cooking oil, agricultural residues, sustainably sourced non-food biomass and algae can offer different sustainability profiles. Some are promising precisely because they reduce competition with food production and natural ecosystems. But we must stop treating the word biofuel as an automatic certificate of environmental responsibility. I have also heard during site visits that Indonesian staff working at Malaysian oil palm plantations feel the Malaysian certifications process is far more robust and accountable than the Indonesian process. What’s missing is a gross lack of respect and lack of engagement for those on the ground who upkeep these plantations. My own grandfather worked as a head of a rubber tapping plantation in Perak and I refuse to accept that my own family and families of those of many who work with their feet in the soil and hands on trees are to be blamed while big companies rake in the profits.
Why I Believe Plastic-To-Fuel Deserves Greater Attention
I can already hear the refrain from the biofuels traders- “come on Mathilda, be reasonable. We need immediate biofuel stocks from palm oil which has optimal fuel specs to replace the insane price fluctuations from strategic wars being fought that cause global fuel blockages.”
My response? Mature oil palm doesn't magically sprout in a week to solve global fuel shortage. Just today my source on the ground showed me photos of baby palm trees on the truck waiting to be planted at areas where the fire burned through forest. Getting it into the ground quickly and having it take root instead of the forest or previous farm regenerating itself will provide justification for expanded land concessions.
I even saw posts from energy stalwarts bashing environmental groups for calling out the role of palm oil, paper and timber plantations in the haze story. I am calling for all to be more solution focused, let’s be logical instead of emotional. The world already possesses an enormous inventory of carbon-rich material that we have manufactured, consumed and discarded.
Plastic.
From packaging and fishing gear to industrial films, ropes, containers and contaminated commercial waste, plastics are accumulating across terrestrial and marine environments. Many of these materials are difficult to recycle economically or technically.
Reducing unnecessary plastic production, reuse and product redesign must come first. Mechanical recycling should remain the second preferred option where it preserves material value and is environmentally justified.
But what happens to plastics that cannot realistically return to the manufacturing cycle? Should they be buried, exported, incinerated or allowed to leak into the environment? Or can we investigate technologies that can recover some of their chemical and energy value?
This is where plastic-to-fuel, or PTF, becomes viable as a strong option.
Plastic-to-fuel uses thermochemical processes to break long polymer chains into smaller hydrocarbon molecules.
One of the more famous and very old technology is pyrolysis, which heats suitable plastic feedstocks in an oxygen-limited or oxygen-free environment. Depending on feedstock composition, reactor conditions, catalysts and downstream treatment, the process can produce hydrocarbon liquids, gases and solid residues. The liquids may subsequently be refined into transport fuels or chemical feedstocks. Unlike crop-derived biofuels, conventional fossil-plastic-derived fuels do not require new agricultural land to produce their carbon feedstock and they can even be low sulphur.
That is an important potential advantage in regions where land-use pressure threatens forests. But there is an equally important qualification: plastic made from petroleum retains fossil carbon. When plastic-derived fuel is burned, it releases fossil carbon dioxide. A strong reason why Ocean Purpose Project has been pushing for microwave technology for Plastic to Hydrogen since 2018.
Plastic-to-fuel is therefore best understood as a waste-derived alternative fuel pathway, not automatically as renewable biofuel or a decarbonisation solution. Its environmental case depends on what waste treatment and energy sources it replaces, the efficiency of conversion, the emissions from processing, and the eventual use of its products. That is the scientific standard Ocean Purpose Project believes the industry must meet.
What Scientific Research Tells Us About Plastic-To-Fuel
A 2019 study published in Materiale Plastice, titled From Plastic to Fuel – New Challenges, investigated the pyrolysis of polypropylene, polyethylene and polystyrene at approximately 450°C where researchers examined mesoporous silica materials, including MCM-41 and SBA-15, as catalysts.
Their findings demonstrated how catalyst selection and securing supply of said catalyst can influence the properties and energy value of pyrolysis products. This is significant because producing a combustible liquid is not the same as producing a commercially acceptable transport fuel.
Fuel quality, composition, stability and consistency are essential. Research into thermochemical conversion has also shown that different polymers behave very differently. Polyethylene and polypropylene are generally promising feedstocks because they consist largely of hydrocarbon chains. Polystyrene can produce useful aromatic compounds, although product handling and upgrading require attention. Polyethylene terephthalate (PET) presents additional challenges because of its oxygen-containing chemical structure. Polyvinyl chloride (PVC) is particularly problematic because thermal degradation can release hydrogen chloride, creating corrosion and emissions-control challenges. For marine plastics, the complexity increases. Ocean-exposed waste may contain salt, sand, organic matter, moisture, additives and biofouling. Consequently, the challenge is no longer merely demonstrating that plastics can be converted into oil. The challenge is building systems capable of doing so safely, continuously, economically and with independently verified environmental performance.
Why Ocean Purpose Project began pursuing Plastic-To-Fuel
Ocean Purpose Project's exploration of plastic-to-fuel solutions dates back to 2018, before the organisation's formal establishment in 2020.
For me, this mission is deeply personal. My own experience with ocean pollution changed the direction of my life and ultimately led me into ocean conservation, sustainability innovation and social entrepreneurship. There was no one who could explain why my face and hair turned white after a weekend of swimming in raw sewage, bacteria and algae bloom. I attended every beach clean up held in Singapore and even went to east coast park every week to clean the beach myself to find some answers.
None came.
This is why our founding mission is simple: Turning Pollution into Solutions.
I did not establish Ocean Purpose Project simply to make cute content and glorify myself as an eco-influencer or to organise performative beach cleanups or ask fellow Asians to pick plastic from rivers, seas, beaches and landfill to make trinkets. I know this is the business model of many in my sector and I cannot deny that through the plastics credit ecosystem, this does provide employment and create a new class of products such as recycled plastic furniture, bricks and décor. In full honesty this is how we pay salaries at Ocean Purpose Project as well- through beach clean ups, turning tetrapak clean up waste into solar powered stools for our staff and even being the first client for The Plastic Project now Plastify to create sports medals and earrings from waste plastic from our beach clean ups.
What is also true if how these activities are also used as “feel good” programmes that ask me and my staff to be a sustainability events planner that fulfils corporate ESG and CSR box ticking exercises instead of solving the problem. I have personally witnessed horror stories of young people attending our clean ups, demanding photos and videos from our staff instead of actually cleaning beaches so they can post how they have “saved the earth” on IG or Tiktok, list those 2 hours as having worked at Ocean Purpose Project on Linkedin or to score points for a VIA school volunteering project. #SorryNotSorry to call this out.
Why does pollution (not just plastics) continue entering our waterways, why do these valuable materials become environmental liabilities, and why are communities repeatedly left managing the consequences of systems they did not design.
Can we have deeper conversations and dig deeper to understand why people are fixated on cute labels like “trash to treasure” but very rarely take the effort to build systems that make it a reality?
During COP27, Ocean Purpose Project was part of Singapore’s 1st COP Pavillion to speak on energy day of the importance of Plastic to Hydrogen. After our presentations, I had a riveting conversation with the mayor of an Egyptian district called Manshiyat Nasr widely known as "Garbage City." Through our Kuwaiti staff who translated for us, he invited us to fly down the very day itself to his town where we would be his guests. The mission? How to turn his 70,000 residents known as the Zabbaleen, a tight-knit, community that has collected and sorted Cairo’s trash door-to-door for generations into plastic to hydrogen solutioneers. The conversation was riveting until we were interrupted rudely by a well dressed lady from an American NGO who started shouting at both of us that chemical recycling of plastics didn’t exist and it was fake news etc. I replied swiftly and with my signature booming radio voice- “Lady, we are standing in Egypt. The land of the ancient People of Ra, the most ancient of civilisations. You will show respect to our host and stop the yelling. Two brown people are talking, you will not interrupt.”
African delegates standing beside the fracas erupted in applause and laughter. The mayor, upset by the verbal attack moved away and a vital opportunity for real solutions by those of us working on the ground was missed. I can remember it clear as day.
Plastic Pollution is not Merely a Waste-Management Problem.
It is a failure of product design, collection systems, infrastructure, commercial incentives and accountability. Aside from the beach clean ups that pay salaries and keep the lights on, our real work lies in exploring technologies that can recover value from difficult waste streams, including plastic-to-fuel and plastic-to-hydrogen pathways.
Singapore offers a strategically important environment for developing these solutions. We are one of the world's major maritime and logistics hubs, with substantial expertise in shipping, bunkering, petrochemicals, engineering, research and environmental regulation. If we can develop a credible, independently validated waste-to-resource solution here, the lessons could be relevant to ports, shipping corridors and island communities across Southeast Asia and beyond.
Five Major Opportunities for Plastic-To-Fuel
1. Reducing pressure on forests and agricultural land
Recovering fuel precursors from existing waste plastics does not require planting additional oil palm, soybean, corn or sugarcane crops.
This creates an opportunity to investigate waste-derived fuels alongside lower-land-impact biofuels, particularly where agricultural expansion presents deforestation risks.
However, plastic-to-fuel should complement—not replace—efforts to develop genuinely low-carbon renewable energy.
2. Transforming maritime waste management
Ships, ports, shipyards and offshore facilities generate plastic waste that must be stored, segregated and transferred into approved waste-management systems.
Ocean Purpose Project is exploring modular conversion technologies designed around maritime environments.
Potential configurations include compact onboard systems, dockside containerised units and larger modular facilities near bunkering or industrial terminals.
Such systems could reduce waste transportation requirements in suitable applications.
Onboard deployment, however, would require rigorous safety assessments and regulatory approval. It must not be assumed that converting ship-generated plastic into fuel automatically satisfies MARPOL requirements.
3. Supporting road transport and industrial fuel markets
Properly upgraded plastic-derived hydrocarbons may provide feedstocks for refineries producing diesel-range or gasoline-range products.
Potential customers include industrial fuel users, transport operators and established fuel producers.
The most commercially practical pathway may be supplying refinery-compatible intermediates rather than attempting to produce finished road fuel inside every small conversion unit.
4. Investigating aviation and marine fuel pathways
Aviation and shipping require fuels with exceptionally demanding performance characteristics.
Plastic pyrolysis oil cannot simply be poured into aircraft or marine engines.
However, selected hydrocarbon fractions may be investigated as refinery feedstocks for producing specification-compliant fuels.
For aviation, plastic-derived fossil hydrocarbons must not be confused with certified sustainable aviation fuel or assumed eligible for SAF incentives.
For shipping, any finished product must meet applicable marine fuel specifications and operational requirements.
These are opportunities for research, qualification and refinery collaboration—not claims of immediate fuel compatibility.
5. Recovering hydrogen and valuable carbon products
Plastic conversion need not focus exclusively on liquid fuel.
Integrated thermochemical processes may produce gases that can be further processed to recover hydrogen.
Carbon-rich residues may also have potential industrial applications, subject to purity, quality and market demand.
Research into catalytic reforming and carbon nanomaterials opens further possibilities.
But commercial value must be demonstrated, not inferred from laboratory yields.
Hydrogen production also requires careful assessment of energy inputs and carbon emissions before any low-carbon designation is justified.
The Technical Barriers We Must Overcome
Plastic-to-fuel has not achieved widespread modular deployment for good reasons.
The industry must confront several difficult engineering and commercial challenges.
Feedstock variability: Mixed plastics produce inconsistent outputs. Reliable sorting, contamination testing and feedstock specifications are essential.
Reactor heat transfer: Efficient conversion requires controlled heating throughout the plastic feedstock. Poor heat distribution creates wax, coke, incomplete conversion and unstable operation.
Catalyst deactivation: Chlorine, metals, sulphur compounds and other contaminants can reduce catalyst performance and increase replacement costs.
Continuous operation: A reactor that operates successfully for several hours is not necessarily commercially viable. Industrial customers need sustained uptime, safe maintenance and predictable operating costs.
Fuel upgrading: Raw pyrolysis oil often requires distillation, treatment or further refining before it can meet transport fuel specifications.
Emissions management: Pyrolysis is not automatically pollution-free. Facilities require appropriate management of process gases, volatile compounds, acid gases, wastewater and contaminated residues.
Modular economics: Smaller units can have higher processing costs per tonne. Their business case must account for avoided transport, waste-handling charges, labour, energy, maintenance and realistic product revenues.
Safety and regulatory approval: Fire prevention, pressure management, gas detection, explosion protection and environmental permitting are fundamental, particularly aboard vessels.
Lifecycle emissions: Any climate benefit must be assessed against credible alternatives, including mechanical recycling, conventional waste treatment and fossil fuel production.
Commercial credibility: The industry must replace exaggerated yield claims with independently verified mass balances, energy balances, product specifications and operating records.
These are not reasons to abandon the technology.
They are reasons to invest in better science, engineering and responsible commercialisation.
The Next Frontier: Distributed Circular Resource Recovery
Research from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology on biofuel supply chains examined how transporting low-density biomass can undermine economic competitiveness. Let’s be real- plastic waste presents a related logistical challenge.
It’s bulky, geographically dispersed and expensive to collect and transport not to mention illegal to transport across country lines- yes there is a division at Interpol dedicated to this. For remote islands, ports and offshore facilities, moving waste to a central processing plant may be a significant part of the total cost.
This is why Ocean Purpose Project is investigating modular, distributed systems.
Rather than assuming that every tonne of waste must travel to a massive central facility, we want to examine whether appropriately sized technologies can be deployed closer to the point of waste generation. Our broader vision includes digital monitoring of feedstocks, conversion performance, product quality and environmental indicators.
We also see opportunities to collaborate with research institutions, engineering companies, refineries, shipowners, port operators and regulators.
A Different Kind of Energy Transition
I do not believe the future belongs to a single alternative fuel. I believe in a future with multiple sources of energy. Electrification, renewable hydrogen, sustainable biomass, waste-derived fuels, efficiency improvements and reduced energy demand all have roles to play. As I write this on my laptop I am powered by solar from our sponsor Modular Technology at my own beach office, built with not just my own hands but with my staff and the people of my town Pasir Ris and using recycled F1 event materials from our long time supporter The Shelter Company. What I believe is backed by actual implementation not just curating thoughts on Claude and ChatGPT.
The correct solution depends on the sector, geography, available resources and environmental consequences. For aviation, maritime transport and other difficult-to-electrify applications, liquid and gaseous fuels will remain important during the transition.
But we should be much more demanding about the origins of those fuels.
A renewable label does not excuse deforestation and yes, a plastic waste-derived label does not excuse fossil carbon emissions. I believe in full emission capture and revalorisation into trace chemicals where a circular economy label does not excuse poor engineering or weak environmental controls.
As the CEO of Ocean Purpose Project, I believe the world must stop accepting environmental trade-offs because a media coach taught us to say this to “stay on brand” while we conveniently move pollution from one ecosystem to another. If forests are being cleared to grow fuel crops while mountains of difficult-to-recycle plastics accumulate in our communities, it is reasonable to ask whether our research priorities and financial incentives are sufficiently balanced. I believe in highly irritable and genius scientists who couldn’t care less about the academic citation game, political correctness, funding security or tenure track who genuinely want to get the problem solved. I believe in well-read and highly efficient government workers who don’t get the corner office or promotions because they are busy solving national crises, who serve the nation daily without applause or follower count increase.
After years of pursuing plastic-to-fuel innovation, I remain convinced that waste-derived fuel technologies deserve serious scientific research, stronger engineering partnerships and carefully designed commercial demonstrations.
Not because plastic-to-fuel is a perfect solution.
But because the global pollution crisis is too serious for us to ignore potentially useful technologies simply because they are difficult. Sewage to fuel, sargassum to fuel- let’s explore it all.
Our responsibility in the environmental sector is to build fit for purpose projects to test them rigorously, improve them continuously and deploy them only where their environmental and economic benefits can be demonstrated. In the current global climate where wars are fought for land, energy and soon water, clean air and food- it is our responsibility as humans to work harder at doing better.
If you have read right to the end, and believe in turning pollution into solutions too, then I believe…in you.
Scientific references and further reading
Constantinescu, M., et al. (2019). From Plastic to Fuel – New Challenges. Materiale Plastice, 56(4), 721–729. DOI: 10.37358/MP.19.4.5259. Experimental research on catalytic pyrolysis of polyethylene, polypropylene and polystyrene.
Nuffield Council on Bioethics (2011). Biofuels: Ethical Issues. Addresses food security, environmental sustainability, human rights, land-use change and climate impacts. Supplied research document.
The Royal Society (2008). Sustainable Biofuels: Prospects and Challenges, Chapter 5: Evaluating the Impact of Biofuels. Examines lifecycle assessment, greenhouse gases, biodiversity, land conversion and water use. Supplied research document.
Makhonko, N. I., et al. (2021). Environmental Problems of Biofuel Production in Modern Energy. IOP Conference Series: Earth and Environmental Science, 688, 012005. DOI. Examines environmental and regulatory dimensions of biofuel development.
Chung, S., & Farrey, M. (2010). Biofuel Supply Chain Challenges and Analysis. Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Research on biomass logistics, feedstock transport and commercial competitiveness.
American Chemistry Council. Regulatory Treatment of Plastics-to-Fuel Facilities. Industry guidance on pyrolysis processes, facility permitting, feedstock specifications and product management. This is an industry advocacy document, rather than an independent regulatory determination.
United Nations Environment Programme. Working as One: How Indonesia Came Together for Its Peatlands and Forests. Examines the 2015 forest fires, haze, peatland degradation and restoration. Read UNEP article.
Ramdani, F., & Hino, M. (2013). Land Use Changes and GHG Emissions from Tropical Forest Conversion by Oil Palm Plantations in Riau Province, Indonesia. PLOS ONE. DOI.
Nature Sustainability (2026). Land-use Optimization for Food Security, Bioenergy and Forest Conservation in Indonesia. Research examining potential land conversion and emissions associated with Indonesia's biofuel expansion. Read study.
Shrestha, K., et al. (2026). Comparative Life Cycle Assessment of Plastic Waste Management Technologies: Environmental Performance of Pyrolysis, Mechanical Recycling, Chemical Recycling and Open Burning. Science of the Total Environment. DOI.
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