Fortum seeks recognition for novel recycling technologies in the Commission’s proposal on packaging regulation

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Key messages

• Novel technologies to recycle plastic packaging waste should be recognised in the proposal.
• Secondary raw material for food packaging will need novel technologies, such as chemical recycling and CCU, in order to comply with the quality required. The recycling rate targets and the targets on recycled content need to be in coherence.
• The timeframe for the requirement on the recyclability of plastic packaging needs to be earlier in order to be in coherence with the recycling targets.
• Very light weight carrier bags made of biodegradable plastic can compromise the quality of other mechanically recycled plastics. The use of biodegradable plastics should be limited to applications that are not at risk of being mixed with other packaging waste. Therefore, very light weight carrier bags should preferably be made of LDPE or HDPE and be directed to collection schemes for mechanical recycling where it can be recycled many times over.
• The Commission should not be empowered to decide on packaging that must be made of biodegradable plastics, because biodegradable plastics endanger the quality of other recycled plastics if they are unintentionally mixed in the collection schemes for plastic packaging waste.
• The regulation should be consistent in the wording for recycled plastics. Article 6 and 7 should use the proposed definition for secondary raw material when it refers to recycled material, in order to avoid confusion. We propose the following amendment in Article 7:
  • 1. From 1 January 2030, the plastic part in packaging shall contain the following minimum percentage of secondary raw materials (recycled content) recovered from post-consumer plastic waste, per unit of packaging
• The proposed modulation of the fees in EPR schemes based on recycled content is a strong incentive to invest in recycling capacity.