Circular economy… worldwide changes

What changes worldwide could have the biggest impact on the circular economy? Read our selection for you for December 2020.

State of play for collected and sorted plastic waste in Europe

The European Commission’s Circular Plastics Alliance has released its new state of play on collecting and sorting. The report looks at the agricultural, automotive, construction, electronic & electric and packaging sectors – bringing together data from more detailed reports already being undertaken in each sector.

The summary serves to identify common challenges across the sectors: the issues of data availability, achieving high collection levels and the sorting of plastic waste are especially prevalent.

The report points to inconsistencies in reporting between member states due to the variation in the methods applied, which leads to not only difficulties in enforcing regulations, but also in carrying out quantitative assessments.

Another highlight of the report is the need to focus on research and development to improve collecting and sorting. This is true across all industries, each of which has its own unique set of challenges that will need to be addressed.

The Circular Plastics Alliance is an initiative launched by the European Commission in 2018 to streamline the voluntary pledges made by the industry in response to the European Plastics Strategy. Its goal is to boost the EU market for recycled plastics to 10 million tonnes by 2025.

The full report can be downloaded here.

Global Commitment 2020 Progress Report published

The Ellen MacArthur Foundation and the United Nations Environment Programme have released their second annual New Plastics Economy Global Commitment Progress Report – taking an in-depth look at the progress of both businesses and government signatories.

The report brings good news on two fronts: considerable progress has been made both in the incorporation of recycled plastics, as well as in the phasing out of items of concern such as PVC packaging and single-use plastics among others.

However, the report also shows that there has been little progress with regards to increasing the recyclability of plastic packaging and reducing the need for single-use packaging altogether. At the same time, progress among signatories is inconsistent: some have made impressive leaps, but others have made little or no progress at all.

In response to the new data, four calls to action have been made. The first two are directed at businesses:

• take bold action on packaging types that are not recyclable today — either developing and executing a credible roadmap to make recycling work, or decisively innovating away from them; and
• set ambitious reduction targets.

The second two apply to governments:

• establish policies and mechanisms that provide dedicated and stable funding for collection and sorting, through fair industry contributions, such as extended producer responsibility (EPR), without which recycling is unlikely to ever scale;
• set a global direction and create an international framework for action, through the United Nations Environment Assembly, building on the vision for a circular economy for plastics.

The Global Commitment 2020 Progress Report can be downloaded here.