By Kathryn Carpenter, Founder & CEO of Cecilia
2025 Neptune Award Winner
What if we lived in a fully circular world where plastic pollution never enters the ocean—and instead becomes valuable materials?
Over 400 million tons of new plastic is produced globally each year, and roughly 90% isn’t recycled. This isn’t necessarily because of lack of effort; many plastics are simply incompatible with today’s recycling systems. As a result, plastic waste leaks into waterways, fragments into microplastics, and impacts marine ecosystems and human health.
Why Hasn’t the Global Plastic Waste Problem Been Solved Yet?
The core challenge is economic. Conventional approaches take a low-value input (plastic waste) and produce a low-value output (degraded plastic or fuel/oils), making it difficult to incentivize collection and processing at scale. To build a truly circular economy, we need pathways that upcycle plastic into something more valuable.
That’s the fundamental problem Cecilia is solving. Our microwave-based process transforms hard-to-recycle plastic into clean hydrogen and advanced carbons—turning waste into value. The hydrogen can self-power our reactors. On the carbon side, Cecilia produces advanced materials including carbon nanotubes and graphitic carbon that can be used as high-performance additives.
Cecilia’s first commercial focus is nanocarbon additives because they can deliver meaningful performance improvements at low loadings. Multi-walled carbon nanotubes are over 100x stronger than steel and offer exceptional conductivity and heat absorption properties, enabling stronger, lighter, and more durable end products across automotive, aerospace, and other industrial applications. Especially relevant to Ocean Exchange’s community, Cecilia is partnering with a leading polymer institute to explore development of a marine anti-fouling coating that leverages advanced carbon additives as an alternative to traditional metal-based coatings that can leach toxins into the ocean.
Looking Ahead
Cecilia is rapidly scaling commercial operations and is engaging strategic partners to support this next phase of expansion. If you are an investor or customer exploring circular nanocarbon additives that deliver environmental impact without sacrificing price or performance, please reach out to continue the conversation.
Contact Cecilia
Contact Kathryn and the Cecilia team at info@ceciliaenergy.com. To learn more, visit Cecilia’s LinkedIn page and website, www.ceciliaenergy.com
