AI for Plastic Value Chain Transformation Challenge

Artificial intelligence (AI) is changing what is possible across the plastic value chain. By characterizing materials down to the molecular level, AI can identify, trace, analyze and redesign plastics with a precision not previously possible: improving materials at source, making recovered materials perform in production, capturing them cleanly at end of use and recovering what remains. Together, these capabilities could shift the economics of circular plastics while reducing pollution and emissions, protecting human health and informing smarter policy, from extended producer responsibility (EPR) to chemical safety.

Plastic production now exceeds 460 million tonnes a year, and inefficiencies at every stage, from how products are designed and materials made to how they are used and handled at end of life, carry growing economic, environmental and health costs. Promising solutions are emerging, but with pilots multiplying, businesses lack a clear signal on which solutions to back and scale.

This Challenge, led by UpLink in collaboration with the World Economic Forum’s Circular Economy Transformation Initiative, sources ventures across four points in the plastics lifecycle where AI can generate the greatest value. Selected ventures will inform the Forum’s insight report on AI-enabled solutions within the plastics value chain and gain access to a global network of corporates, investors and policymakers to support deployment and scale. Solutions may span several focus areas, and applicants should select the one that best reflects their primary value proposition.