According to the 2018 European Plastics Strategy, about 25 million tonnes of plastic waste is produced in Europe each year, but less than 30% is collected for recycling, and only 15% of collected waste gets recycled and makes its way back into products. Chemical recycling technologies can help meet the EU targets on recycling plastics. Improving Europe’s recycling capabilities plays an important role in lowering emissions by 55% by 2030, and contributing to EU Green Deal ambitions around circularity and climate neutrality.

 

To get there, more plastic waste needs to be collected, sorted and prepared for recycling, and a wider range of markets need to be supplied with recycled content. Cefic calls for an enabling European policy framework for the scale-up and full deployment of these technologies.

 

According to Henk Pool, Cefic Innovation Manager, “the European Commission is currently revising key legislative files related to products and waste. Chemical recycling needs to be recognised as a recycling route, and covered by the definition of recycling in the EU legislation so that it could contribute to achieving the 2050 full circular economy targets. What we also need in the start-up phase is the recognition and acceptance of a chain of custody mass balance model.”

 

A combination of complementary solutions is necessary for higher recycling rates for plastics. Currently, there are three main routes for recycling of plastics. Mechanical recycling, dissolution recycling, and chemical recycling. The latter can treat mixed and contaminated plastic waste that cannot be recycled mechanically and has the potential to remove undesired additives and impurities. It breaks down the plastic into feedstocks and monomers so new chemicals and plastics can be made equivalent to those made from fossil resources, and compliant with REACH. It makes it possible to produce chemicals and plastics from the plastic waste which now goes to landfill or gets incinerated or exported.  

 

According to the Quantis report “Chemical Recycling: Greenhouse gas emission reduction potential of an emerging waste management route”, commissioned by Cefic, chemical recycling technologies can also help in restoring sustainable carbon cycles, lower the dependency on virgin fossil raw materials, and avoid greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions that occur in feedstock production and from incineration of plastic waste.

 

To scale up and fully implement chemical recycling, the chemical industry is committed to working under specific guiding principles, such as:

 

1. Increase collaboration to bring more valuable recycled content to the market;

2. Generate and collect data to better understand the environmental performance, benefits, and contributions of these technologies, including the conduction of Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) studies; and

3. Foster transparency and contribute to the development of uniform standards for a chain of custody mass balance approach, which is included in the chain of custodies models as defined in ISO 22095.