“Packaging recycling begins with design” says industry body

“Plastic packaging design threatens new EU recycling targets”, according to a recent statement issued by EuPR (Plastics Recyclers Europe).

The organisation recently said that “packaging recycling does not begin with collection but design.” The group blames the idea that modern packaging designs today are focused mainly on maximising performance and that careless design may lead to problems with fully emptying packets, as well as material combinations which are incompatible with recycling.

Plastics Recyclers Europe believes that the introduction of an EU classification system will assist designers in evaluating their creations, in addition to helping them choose the best options to improve their recyclability classification.

RecyClass is the concept proposed as a solution, and is intended to build on existing Design for Recycling Guidelines. It will offer a platform to determine the recyclability class of plastic package designs, based on a scale from A to G (seven classes comparable to EU energy efficiency classes).

“Many months ago we started working on this project. At this stage a first draft of our model is being tested in several technical institutes in different European Countries.” said Paolo Glerean who heads PRE’s packaging design task force. “Our goal is to present the RecyClass tool during a special event at Interpack in Duesseldorf in May 2014”.