recycling

Ball Corporation, a leading global provider of infinitely recyclable aluminum beverage packaging, and aluminum recycler and supplier Novelis, announced that the Ball Aluminum Cup™ is now composed of 90% recycled content. This evolution builds on the Ball Aluminum Cup's infinite recyclability by lowering its carbon footprint, therefore further positioning the product as a sustainable solution for packaging waste challenges across the sports and entertainment, food service, retail and beverage industries.

Transitioning to Sustainable Packaging 

Manufacturers and consumer goods companies worldwide are prioritizing efforts to reduce their virgin plastic consumption after decades of growth. In fact, companies, governments, and other organizations representing more than 20 percent of the plastic packaging market committed to ambitious goals for 2025 to realize a common vision of a circular economy for plastics.

Kremsmünster, Austria (March 2022). Greiner Packaging’s stated aim is to keep plastic circulating in the economy for as long as possible. To this end, the packaging specialists look to work together with their customers to create new packaging solutions that can be recycled themselves and, ideally, contain recycled material, too. This was also the declared goal of Harvest Moon, and the plastic cups in the new cardboard-plastic solutions for its fermented yogurt alternatives are produced from 100% r-PET, making them super sustainable.

In 2020, Bumble Bee launched “Seafood Future,” a sustainability and social impact program with three areas of focused commitment: Fish, Ocean, and People. The commitments included a goal to ensure that 98% of Bumble Bee packaging would be recyclable by 2025. This change from shrink wrap to paperboard will move the brand from 96% to 98% readily recyclable packaging, surpassing the goal timeline by 3 years.

To meet industry needs for sustainable printing methods and environmentally friendly packaging production, Xeikon America has debuted TITON technology, a new toner formulation offering all the benefits of UV inks without the disadvantages.

The UK Plastics Packaging Tax comes into effect from 1 April 2022 and is intended to increase the amount of recycled material used in packaging products. A survey conducted by the BPF found that less than a third of companies feel that they fully understand the upcoming tax. Areas of uncertainty include the evidence companies are required to submit and when companies are eligible for tax credits. Uncertainty also exists around calculating the amount of tax liable (if any), how VAT is to be applied and the information that is required on invoices for tax-eligible products.

Reducing discarded plastic sachet as marine plastic pollution

2.7 million metric tons of plastic waste are generated in the Philippines each year with about 20 per cent ending up in the ocean. Single-serving plastic packaging has posed as one of the biggest waste issues in this country where an estimated 163 million pieces of sachets are consumed daily, according to the World Bank.

According to Swiss Recycling, the signatories of the ‘Closing cycles for plastic packaging and beverage cartons’ Pact have committed to applying circularity principles and signaled the importance of establishing a circular economy for packaging in Switzerland by 2030.

Patrik Geisselhardt, managing director of Swiss Recycling, comments: “The patch is an important sign that a nationally coordinated solution is coming, and we are pleased that so many organizations are pulling together.”

Dow recently introduced its first post-consumer recycled (PCR)-rich resin for collation shrink film in North America, enabling companies to incorporate more post-consumer materials while maintaining the application performance.

The recycled plastic resin, which is designed specifically for retail and logistic shrink film applications, expands Dow’s circular technology portfolio to help more customers and brands achieve their sustainability goals by offering the ability to create shrink film with up to 40% PCR content.