Looks like a story about someone trying to recycle plastic by using it as an ingredient in [polymer-concrete](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polymer_concrete ).

As for polymer-concrete's history (https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/B978184569... ):

> The history of the research and development of polymer concrete is relatively short compared with that of conventional cement concrete. The early research and development of the polymer concrete was done mainly in the Soviet Union (currently, Russia),1 the United States,2 Germany3 and Japan4 in the late 1950s to the early 1960s.

The idea of making polymer-concrete with recycled-plastic has also been around. For a random review article (https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/B978085709...):

> Abstract: [...] The volume of polymeric wastes such as tyre rubber and polyethylene terephthalate (PET) bottles is increasing at a fast rate. [...] The majority is just landfilled. This chapter reviews research published on the performance of concrete containing tyre rubber and PET wastes. Furthermore it discusses the effect of waste treatments, the size of waste particles and the waste replacement volume on the fresh and hardened properties of concrete.