Food Packaging and the rPET closed loop
The world of food packaging is moving at a rapid pace. Packaging manufacturers, food companies and end users themselves are looking for solutions with the common goal of improving the use of packaging, such as prolonging its life with reusable packaging, reducing the amount of plastic used and using materials that are recyclable.
So far in Europe, the only recycling system that has been fully implemented is that of PET bottles, but it is gaining ground on all fronts since the approval of the EU Directive 2019/904, known as the “Single Use Plastic Directive“.
This is changing the PET bottle value scenario, requiring:
- Specific separate collection with targets for PET beverage bottles of 77% by 2025, and 90% by 2029.
- A mandatory 25% rPET content in PET beverage bottles as from 2025, to be increased to 30% from 2030.
Having into account that the only source of recycled PET nowadays is the bottle collection and washing, if the EU Commission goal is achieved, before 2029 there will be a lack of recycled plastic available for any other use. Therefore, it is of paramount importance to develop collection and recycling systems for other plastic packaging format different from bottles.
ILPA Group, which MP3 belongs to, is already working in this fields together with collection companies and European organisation in order to provide PET packaging design guidelines for recycling, evaluate PET packaging solutions and technologies and facilitate understanding of the effects of new innovations on recycling processes. We are working to develop other ways to recycling, such as PET Tray-to-tray.
