21. Legislation and plastic

21.

Legislation and plastic

A new Europe-wide EU Strategy for Plastics in the Circular Economy arrived in 2018. It’s aimed to transform how plastic products are designed, produced, and recycled, up until 2030. The strategy also includes specific ways of measuring this and new possible legislative instruments. Highlights in the strategy are how the impact of single-use plastic and plastic waste affects our nature, seas, and oceans.

Today, plastics are everywhere in our daily life. It’s used in packaging, buildings, cars, electronics, agriculture, and other sectors. Plastic production is today 20 times higher than in the 1960s, and it is forecasted to almost quadruple by 2050. Although there are thousands of different types of plastics, 90% are derived from virgin fossil fuels. About 6% of global oil consumption is used to produce plastics; by 2050, this share could reach as high as 20%. In Europe, in 2014 about 39% out of 25 million tons post-consumer plastic waste was incinerated with energy recovery. The rest is either landfilled (31%) or recycled (only 30%). About half of that plastic waste collected and recycled is treated in the European Union while the other half is exported, mainly to China. The interest in recycled plastic in Europe is still too low. Now we see a change, with new factories emerging also in Sweden. In 2019, there will be a new hightech factory in Motala, made by FTI (Förpackning & Tidnings Insamlingen), that will have a capacity to recycle 110 million tons plastic per year. Today, Sweden is feeding the market roughly 140 million tons of plastic and we only recycle around 60 tons, of this half goes abroad (mainly shipped to Germany) for recycling.

Plastic is cheap, durable, and versatile, and brings us multiple benefits in our daily economy. But these very qualities can also pose problems when plastics end up for recycling or in our environment, with impacts on Mother Nature. Still we see a high dependence on virgin fossil feedstock, in 2014 more than 90% of the total amount of plastics were produced from fossil fuel feedstock. The 192 countries with a coast bordering the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian oceans, Mediterranean and Black seas produced a total of 2.5 billion tons of solid waste. Of that, 275 million tons were plastics, and an estimated 8 million tons of mismanaged plastic waste entered the ocean only in 2010. Plastic packaging is estimated to represent the highest share, as its weight, size, and low-value make it prone to uncontrolled disposal. This problem is present worldwide, as most of the bulk of plastic leakage takes place outside of the EU (in particular in fastgrowing Asian economies). A new study from 2017 shows the top 10 rivers, 8 of which are in Asia (4 of them in China) and 2 in Africa (Niger and Nile), accounted for up to 95% of the total global load because of the mismanagement of waste. Dr. Christian Schmidt, a hydrogeologist at Helmholtz-Centre for Environmental Research (UFZ) in Leipzig, Germany, said: ‘A substantial fraction of marine plastic debris originates from land-based sources and rivers potentially act as a major transport pathway for all sizes of plastic debris.’

THE 10 RIVERS

→ Yangtze, East China Sea, Asia → Indus, Arabian Sea, Asia → Yellow River, Yellow Sea, Asia → Hai He, Yellow Sea, Asia → Nile, Mediterranean, Africa → Ganges, Bay of Bengal, Asia → Pearl River, South China Sea, Asia → Amur, Sea of Okhotsk, Asia → Niger, Gulf of Guinea, Africa → Mekong, South China Sea, Asia

Therefore, what have we learned from a converter’s perspective? There is a big change going on. The packaging market will never be as it was before. We’ll see a transformation on almost every level. New demands from the brand owners will also occur, driven by us consumers and how our market succeeds in influencing their choices in the future. Circular (both the environment and the economy) is where the EU with legislation and strategies wants to make an impact. One problem is that the work isn’t only based on statistics from inside the EU, but often global. Yes, we are all responsible for our own globe. However, you should be careful and accurate when you are reading all statistics and facts. I’ve read a lot of reports on this topic and have found many errors. There is more to ask for when it comes to mixing data between Sweden, Europe, and worldwide. We are doing pretty good with handling waste in Sweden and Europe. Yes, we can do more, but when someone tries to scare people with data not representative of where we are located, forcing people to change their behavior because of big problems somewhere else, that can be very unfitting and incorrect. It will not really solve the issue. This happens too many times and is often done to help someone else benefit from it. They are what we call lobbyists; it’s big money and exists in many markets. Take the eco food as an example. Consumers pay extra money for the eco label. It helps us feel like we are doing something good for the environment. This is without knowing the actual effect, without considering that producing eco means less food per square meter and includes more transportation.

Eco itself has nothing to do with being locally produced – it doesn’t correlate. What we do know is that we as consumers, by buying increasingly more eco food, today assist in raising the retailer’s profit.

Removing plastic bags is a good initiative; then again 88-95% of all plastic garbage in the oceans is generated from ten rivers mainly in Asia. Still it’s important to reduce the way we consume plastic and especially the singleuse plastic that takes 5 seconds to produce, are used in 5 minutes, and take 500 years to get rid of in our environment. The balance of how we produce, consume and circular packaging will be important and a priority among politicians with new regulations and new laws. All politicians, regardless of political affiliation, have this on their agenda coming into this year’s election in Sweden, so much that the Green Party itself will have a hard time gaining enough own votes on this issue.