The good Cornellians can do: Jeff Gold ’79
In 2008, Jeff Gold '79 read about a Swiss company that was working to convert plastic grocery bags into oil that could then be used to make new plastic products. This seemed improbable to Jeff, who had spent his career working in environmental remediation. His company, Integrated Environmental Services (IES), worked to safely deal with dangerous materials like chemical and biological weapons, gases, and radioactive waste.
Jeff began experimenting to see if the Swiss idea had merit. He heated up some plastic in a beaker and watched what happened.
“My eyes were glued to tube exiting the beaker,” he says. “At first a few small wisps of vapor came out of the tube but then, a drop of liquid appeared and dropped into the waiting cup below. A second drop immediately followed. At that moment, I knew that transforming film plastic that was bound for a landfill could be a reality.”
Jeff responded by founding a new company, Nexus Circular, which has spent the past 18 years perfecting the technology to recycle used plastic. Along the way, they have encountered and worked through numerous challenges. These include how to deal with contaminants in the plastic feedstock, scaling up to make the process profitable, finding the right partners to use the purified oil, and securing the investment needed to grow.
Jeff and his team have worked through each of these issues. Nexus is now partnering with some of the world’s largest petrochemical companies to recycle millions of pounds of plastic waste every month.
He says his company has two foundational principles: “Hard things are hard,” and “Everything is figure-out-able.”
“Converting plastic waste into a valuable resource is hard, and there are a lot of companies that have tried to do this and failed,” he observes. “When we hear about new companies starting up because they’ve seen what we’re accomplishing, and when I hear that students are pursuing environmental studies based on what they’ve seen us do, that is proof that what we’re doing is making an impact.”
Jeff is proud that his son, Evan Gold MBA ’26, will take on a leadership role at IES after he graduates from Cornell in May.
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