It should come as no surprise to anyone that we all want to recycle more. In 2020, the Environmental Protection Agency set a goal to increase the national recycling rate to 50%, up from 32%. And while some plastic items such as plastic bottles have recycling rates of between 22% and 29%, less than 1% of flexible plastic film products are recycled. The plastics industry wants those rates to increase and we’re working to do just that.
Flexible plastic film products, or “flexibles”, like grocery store bags and the thin plastic wrap that protects your food, are types of plastic products that present specific challenges when it comes to keeping them within our circular economy. This isn’t a challenge unique to plastics; paper napkins, tissues and even aluminum foil aren’t widely accepted for recycling, either. Recycling works best on products that are rigid and substantial because these are the easiest to sort and collect. But now, many plastic flexibles can be recycled, and new innovations will make it possible to recycle even more.
This week in Grapevine, leaders of industry are meeting at the Plastics Recycling Conference to discuss the innovations available to take recycling to the next level. Many of the investments in these advancements have been made by companies themselves, as they understand the necessary commitment to sustainability needed to increase recycling rates. The expertise, expansive research, science, chemistry and technology that have been put towards working together to see these rates increase, is astonishing.
The road to a future where most plastic products can be recycled will require acknowledging and addressing many systemic challenges. We know no single company can do this alone, and we believe that our industry has a role to play in creating solutions. That’s why we recently launched a new initiative, the Flexible Film Recycling Alliance.
FFRA was created to improve the recycling of flexible film products by working to accelerate recycling rates, preserve access and boost education. This alliance will convene industry representatives from across the supply chain to develop solutions to address the challenges surrounding the recycling of flexibles.
Consumers have expressed a lack of confidence and confusion regarding how and where to recycle flexible plastics. We recognize this and want to help by creating and operating a best-in-class plastic film directory, making it easier to find a recycling location. For most consumers, store drop-off is the most commonly accepted method for collecting flexibles for recycling, though initiatives exist that are looking to expand acceptance in curbside recycling.
We use flexibles because of the many advantages they provide. It’s typically lighter and more durable than alternative options, and production requires less energy, as shown by the Flexible Packaging Association. Flexibles are used to protect and preserve our food, cutting down on food waste — the sixth-largest source of greenhouse gas emissions, not to mention keeping medicine safer and providing sterile packaging for medical instruments. Eliminating the use of plastic bags could result in worse environmental outcomes. A recent study conducted by Freedonia on New Jersey’s bag ban found that this type of policy led consumers to use more woven and non-woven polypropylene plastic, which are not recyclable.
We want consumers to feel confident that the material they dispose of correctly is recycled into new products. We’ve shown through another sustainability campaign, Recycling is Real, that demonstrating that recycling works and is happening every day is key to building trust in the process. Additionally, we are working with industry partners to create a system for retailers to verify the information in the directory. This includes a transparency section on our website to share how we collected the data in the directory and how it is verified.
Flexibles are complex so that they can perform their intended function, which can make them difficult to recycle through traditional means, but advanced recycling technologies allow for more flexibles to be recycled and we’ll be educating policymakers as to those methods.
The combined effort to educate consumers on how and where to recycle will be for naught if the material is not made into new products. To that end, the FFRA will also support initiatives to make flexible recycling more efficient and to encourage the use of recycled content in flexible products as well.
The plastics industry wants and is committed to seeing all of us recycle more. We don’t want recyclable products to end up in landfills or our environment. Instead, let’s keep that valuable material in our circular economy to be reused or repurposed into something new.
Patrick Krieger is vice president of Sustainability for the Plastics Industry Association.
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