Wanted: More information about plastics recycling

National Harbor, Md. — Consumers and regulators alike are increasingly demanding details behind plastic recycling.

"It's really going from a nice-to-have to an absolute-must-have," said Mark Huber, vice president of business development at iSustain, which provides recycling and landfill diversion services.

Anne Johnson, a principal and senior vice president of global corporate sustainability at consulting firm Resource Recycling Systems, is seeing the change.

"I think the bar is rising rapidly, both through consumer expectation and regulatory pressure to have more transparent and complete supply chain reporting," she said at the Plastics Recycling Conference in National Harbor, near Washington, D.C.

"We're seeing growth in regulations requiring information across the entire supply chain. So Europe has passed some new regulations that you need to be able to assure that no child labor or slave labor was used in the sourcing of your materials. I think this requirement for supply chain — not just accountability, but reporting from where is the origin of the material, who processed it, where it is going — is really important for that consumer story so they know that what they put in that bin didn't end up in a pile of plastic in Malaysia or something like that," she said.

A lot of recycling equipment, such as optical sorters, already have the ability to store data, but those capabilities are not always used, said Charles David Mathieu-Poulin, manager of public affairs and shareholder relations at flexible packaging maker TC Transcontinental.

"A lot of the manufacturers of equipment have add-ons where you can get that data. But most of the MRFs [materials recovery facilities] don't get it because right now they don't see the use of that. I think that's something that's definitely going to change. I think the brands are going to want to have better understanding of what's happening to their products," he said.

It's no longer going to be enough just to recycle, Johnson said. "There is a growing demand for details such as who is processing the material, where the material originated and where the recycled resin is going," Johnson said.

Tonya Randell is public/private engagement manager for Stina Inc., a research and consulting firm.

"We believe that measuring what matters across the whole value is a critical piece. So we're not talking about just how much is collected, how many pounds or the recycling rate or how much PCR [post-consumer plastic] is made and produced and used in packaging of products. Or how many recyclers or reclaimers are in the market. We want to talk about the whole thing," Randell said. "We believe that collaboration and transparency lead to better data, better tracking and better decision-making."

Do you have an opinion about this story? Do you have some thoughts you'd like to share with our readers? Plastics News would love to hear from you. Email your letter to Editor at [email protected]

Please enter a valid email address.

Please enter your email address.

Please verify captcha.

Please select at least one newsletter to subscribe.

View the discussion thread.