Overwhelming plastic waste

We are rapidly replacing steel, glass, wood and other materials with plastic. Yet whilst society’s consumption of plastics steadily increases, and our landfills reach their limits, we still maintain the public impression that, through waste collection and recycling, we can manage our resources. The EU Commission demonstrates resolve by imposing high recycling quotas.

However, the reality only becomes evident when existing published data from 2006 is analysed in context: We still bury 50% and incinerate 30% of collected plastic waste (in 2003 it was 60% and 20%). At this rate we are returning 80% (15.5 million tons) of waste, or 31% of the plastics produced in Europe (in 2003 it was 50%), to the environment. Of course one has to ask, whether this has been done in an ecological manner, even if incineration is considered as energy recycling and is favoured as the best solution by the plastic producing industry (because it requires new production). Mechanical recycling has limitations, although one should not undervalue the volumes recycled (at least 4.5 million tons).

Feedstock recycling is almost irrelevant at only 2,2% and one can conclude that this technology is, as yet, undeveloped. The data the for the above chart has been taken from a study published in January 2008  entitled “The Compelling Facts about Plastics” from Plastics Europe – Association of Plastics Manufacturers (www.plasticseurope.org)¹⁾.

The high recycling rates as published by APME in 2004²⁾ were strongly questioned by the European Plastics Recyclers Association (EuPR)³¹⁾, which reported declining recycling levels and plastic waste export flows continuing to damage their business. EuPR participated in the recent survey and the trend clearly shows rapidly increasing plastic production volumes, when the collected volume of post consumer plastic waste stagnates, resulting in recycling levels below 10% (mechanical and feedstock recycling) of the produced plastics. But for sure the plastic will show up once again, the question is only when and how. According to the survey after all there are still 280 million tons in circulation from the production period from 1993 til 2006 or may be located at places not known to us..
(www.plasticker.de )

What is the attractiveness of energy, water and plastic waste?

All resources on earth are limited and major companies are striving to manage their consumption and production of energy, water and waste. The ongoing concentration in these markets has nothing to do with a lack of profitability, on the contrary, there are guaranteed profit margins to be gained due to the dependence of countries, their citizens and governments on these resources. Oil prices continued to rise steadily and, as a consequence, so did the prices for raw materials used for plastic production, which in turn led to further consolidation and job losses. In the meantime, it is no longer a secret that the national oil reserves of the United States will only suffice for another 40 years – making a forecast for the future development of plastic prices not too difficult.
Then the financial crisis came and fear for lacking demand made the oil price decline again. Prices for commodity plastics and their raw-materials decreased in an even larger extent, showing the unreality of the situation. But prices will increase again when economy stabilizes and OPEC will force their point. At low oil prices investment in oil production is retained, because of lacking profitability, thus leading to a stop of new projects, which will be taken up again when recovering economy creates the pre-programmed supply crunch and pushes the oil price up again. The prices for plastics will of course follow.  

What logic lies behind the high unrealistic recycling quotas of the EU Commission and the national subsidies for the collection and sorting of plastic waste (often passed on as a compulsory levy for consumers), when many of these feed-stocks, collected at great expense, are then sold cheaply to the Far East, yet ultimately return to us as cheap end-products (e.g. polyester in textile fibres or polystyrene in injection-moulded parts). Does it want to further undermine the competitiveness of European production sites?

If our citizens have already financed the collection of these resources, then surely it is they who should benefit from new technologies and jobs, created through the recycling of our plastic waste. 
Many of our products could be more competitive, if our costs were reduced through intelligent recycling and if we were able to use our waste ourselves, instead of handing it to our competitors so that they can further reduce their costs.
Increasing feed-stock prices will inevitably lead to higher recycling costs, and thus create new, attractive and profitable industries.
What was once considered unattractive due to low oil prices, should be today an intelligent step to achieving cost-attractive feed-stocks.

The new raw-material policy of the European Commission from November 2008 concludes, that “Recycling presents a huge opportunity to reduce import dependency for raw materials,” lamenting that many end-of-life products are “illegally shipped outside the EU and are hence not recycled within the EU” ³²⁾.

The Basel Convention from 22 March 1989, on the Control of Transboundary Movements of Hazardous Wastes and Their Disposal, is an International treaty.

The European Union has adopted the Council Regulation 259/93/EC on the supervision and control of shipments of waste for all member states in 1993. The new Regulation (EC) No 1013/2006 of the European Parliament and the Council replaces 259/93 and applies since 12 July 2007, aiming at preventing fictitious waste recycling.

Who actually knows where electronic waste with flame retardants from Europe and USA for example is transported to?

                                                                                              April 2008 / updated 12/2008
                                                                                              Dr. Gerald G. Altnau
                                                                                              Associate of CreaCycle GmbH
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Literature:
1.   APME – „The compelling facts about plastics“ published January 2008 - PDF
2.   Plastics Europe – “An analysis of plastics consumption and recovery in Europe” published Summer 2004 - PDF
31. Plasticker News 21 April 2006 „EuPR: Concern about Plastics Europe Study on Waste Management“ – Link
32. EU Commission proposal outline raw material policy - 4 November 2008 - link