Follow the latest news from Petcore Europe. This is the fourth newsletter of 2020 featuring messages from our President and Executive Director, updates on our Working Groups, our Communications Campaign, the EU and national regulatory landscape, our internal structure and many more topics.

Messages from the Petcore Europe President and Executive Director

Dear Petcore Europe members and partners,

First and foremost, the PETCORE Management Team wish all our members and readers, a most relaxing festive season. Safe and the ability to enjoy as best as possible family time under the extreme  circumstances we experience currently.

2020 has brought many changes in personal and business life. In many respects we had hoped for more advances in our projects, especially in the “Circular Plastics Arena”, however we have learnt to be patient and continue to work under difficult circumstances to deliver on promoting PET as the best product for the outlets defined. PET remains appreciated for its performance although we must admit the whole aspect of “anti-plastic” remains a major paradigm to overcome.

We are proud that our membership still grows, resonating that PETCORE-Europe is a platform respected for representing the value chain.

More “Focused Working Groups” have evolved at the request and instigation of members, exhibiting engagement from the value chain to drive sustainability. Reports are to be read in this newsletter.

Add to this that PETCORE is leading now the work inside the CPA in standardization, monitoring, to mention two programs, it has been rewarding to look back at what has been achieved.

With this, our desire is that our members have gained value in their membership and we continue to be a force in the advocacy agenda for promoting PET as a sustainable product with a strong future. We wish everyone an enjoyable festive season and a healthy and prosperous 2021.

Stephen Short, President of Petcore Europe

Dear Members,

We are still progressing which allows us to continue to reinforce ourselves:

We continue our progression and are today 106 members. Since 2017 we have set four clear objectives: 1) to become financially sound; 2) to reconnect with the Brussels institutions and associations; 3) to reinforce our Technical Committee and Working Groups and 4) for 2020 was to start a communication campaign in order to communicate around the environmental advantages of PET as well as to enable the Brussels decision-makers to differentiate PET from other plastics. We are well on our way to attain these goals and we shall develop this in more detail in this newsletter.

Petcore Europe is well prepared for the Green Deal:

2020 was the first year of the EU “Green Deal”, which aims to accelerate among other issues the de-carbonisation of all economic sectors by mobilising Member States’ public environmental policies. Its ambition is to see and act beyond climate change by also addressing other environmental degradations. This translates into concrete EU Regulations, Directives and Actions Plans such as the circular economy for plastics. Here, PETCORE EUROPE, thanks to its participation, its members and via its assessment evaluation processes and guidelines for recycling, is getting more and more engaged on behalf of the PET industries.

Our teams are leading CPA product team groups for Standardisation for recycling:

In parallel with the Green Deal, the CPA (Circular Economy Alliance) and the plastics industry has committed to the Commission (more particularly to DG GROW) to recycle 10 million tons by 2025. This latter DG has initiated this process and acts as an efficient facilitator for this engagement. PETCORE EUROPE by undertaking to lead the Standardization PET Product Team for Beverage and Trays will play a decisive role. Our objective is to help achieving a more harmonised EU industry landscape by elaborating European standards in partnership with the European Platform CEN CENELEC. Moreover, we are also partnering with PRE, VINYL PLUS and PLASTICS EUROPE to monitor Recycled Content in the EU plastics industry. We chose EuCertPlast to carry out this monitoring. It  focuses on traceability and assessment of conformity and recycled content throughout the supply chain. Currently, 40 per cent of the PET recyclers are using EuCertPlast’s services.

Regulatory affairs have become a priority to tackle:

More so, with Carl Eric Portaels, our new Policy and Communications Manager, we are now heavily involved in regulatory affairs for example engaging on the Packaging and Packaging Waste Directive amendment, the Green Claims Regulation, Comparative LCA of Alternative Feedstocks for Plastic Production, Circular Economy and SUPD issues such as Recycled Content and Essential Requirements.

“In fine” for 2021:

We have been developing very quickly and for 2021 our goal will be to concentrate on our communication campaign, to continue to reinforce our Technical Committee, our 3 new Working Groups for Labels, Reuse, LCA and of course the other Working Groups. We do this with the ultimate aim of having PET as the material of choice.

Thanking you all for your help and support in 2020. We look forward to continue this vital co-operation  in 2021. For our part, PETCORE EUROPE will maintain our efforts to convince both the public and the policy-makers that PET is the most circular material. Our President Stephen Short, The PETCORE EUROPE team and I are wishing you a merry Christmas and best wishes for a healthy and happy 2021.

Christian Crépet, Executive Director of Petcore Europe

Communications Campaign Update

Over the last months, we have worked intently to finally roll out our Communications Campaign. First and foremost we signed contracts with two major agencies to help us in this enterprise: Fleishman Hillard, a reputable international communications/public affairs agency with offices in Brussels and Fehr Advice, a Swiss behavioral economics agency based in Zurich. 

With a budget of around 500 000 Euros, collected thanks to the generosity of our members, the latter agencies' aim is to advocate the merits of PET in Europe and most importantly in the Brussels EU bubble. To do so both agencies carried out targeted research on the consumer and policy-maker  perceptions towards PET.  Their findings pointed at the high level of ignorance concerning PET and this in Italy, Germany, France and the UK: people continue to amalgamate PET with the generic term 'plastic'. Likewise, their studies showed how most people have a low awareness of and even distrust towards the recycling process behind the PET industry. Moreover, consumers tend to view plastics pollution as a big issue, particularly ocean pollution across all analysed markets. Lastly, the blame, for those surveyed, is often put on the shoulders of well-established brands with high visibility in the sector. Encouragingly, EU policy-makers have a more positive outlook regarding the future of PET as long as the industry keeps working on improving recycling rates. 

As the above clearly shows, the consumers market is not yet mature to understand all the virtues of PET. We must thus push forward with our communications tools. These will be, in first instance, an infographic explaining the benefits of PET in a circular economy as well as an animation in the same vain. We all encourage you to share and spread these tools as widely as possible once these will be transmitted to you. Our infographic is already finalised and will be sent shortly while our animation will be fully 'animated' in early January! Last but not least, our campaign which will be rolled out in Brussels as well as in a European country (to be chosen), will heavily lean on an informative website planned for the end of February. 

Finally, as most of you already know, we held a successful kick-off meeting in October. We expect the same for our 'Presentation of Results Meeting' in January where all the results of the two agencies will be presented to a larger audience. As follow-up to that meeting we will actively share the various reports made by Fleishman Hillard and Fehr Advice to put you really at the forefront of our findings! 

Working Groups Update

We have created a series of new working groups (pictured above). This will hopefully trigger a great involvement of our members. Parallel to this, a significant 'restructuring' work is in progress which include new internal rules for the governance of the working groups. See below the organisation of the different working groups:

-Labels and Reuse WG’s are officially launched. The LCA WG is still work in progress.

-The Thermoform working Group has progressed on the recyclability evaluation protocol and process. Members can now apply to the process and get an evaluation via the ‘Tray Evaluation Platform’.

-PING will deploy an open SIG for members to get access to non-confidential information regarding NIAS.

-The O&F Working Group has reinitiated some activity around outlets for white opaque material.

-The Monomer Forum that took place in October was a huge success and another forum is planned for October. The Monomer WG (SIG) has held its last meeting on 15th December . Progress was made on 2 core elements:

1) the NIAS evaluation program for the different technologies : this program is now launched with raw materials for the test program available and should be sent shortly to the candidates;

2) the regulatory path forward for the different technologies: Jesper Van Berkel and Stephen Short will lead this topic to ensure that the proper regulation is established.

Regulatory Update

National Level

We are currently facing a barrage of national legislative measures aiming at undercutting the European PET sector. In this context, we have seen projects or concrete legislative measures mushroom in France, Italy, the UK and Spain. The most significant one is of course the EU Plastic tax of 0,80 EURO cent/kilo on non-recycled plastic packaging. If you wish to receive an update on this last one matter please let us know and we will send you our related presentation.

Regarding Spain, we are currently assisting our Spanish partners to counter a legislative proposal the Spanish Ministry of Agriculture aims to pass to ban plastic bottles for extra virgin olive oil in Spain. More precisely, we hired a reputable law firm to draft a legal memo in order to submit this under the TRIS procedure of the Commission. We hope this will trigger a standstill period of the legislation and lead to discussions between the Spanish government and the EU.

EU Level

Green Claims Regulation

At EU level, Petcore Europe participated in a consultation on the Green Claims Regulation. This EU-planned Regulation aims at combatting the exaggerated green claims made by certain companies and/or products; this in an attempt to empower the European consumer in his/her choice towards greener products. As an EU Regulation the regulatory power of the legislative measure will be strong and directly applicable to all EU Members States. The draft legislative proposal will be see the light of day in Q2 2021.

PPWD

As you know the Essential Requirements of the Packaging and Packaging Waste Directive are under review. In this context the European Union has launched a consultation to which PETCORE EUROPE will participate as well as publish a joint position paper with Plastics Recyclers Europe (PRE).  

Structure Update

WG LCA

At PETCORE EUROPE we want to remain closely updated on the latest scientific work of PET Life Cycle Assessments. In order to do so we have created a LCA Working Group that will convene on a regular basis to review the most recent studies on PET LCA and incorporate it as best as possible into our external advocacy and communications efforts.

WG Communications

With the launch of our Communications Campaign we will formalise a WG on communications that will coalesce around the current group working on the Communications Campaign. Its aim will be to steer and monitor the Communications Campaign.

Petcore Europe Administration 

From an administrative perspective 2020 has been an unusually challenging year. Since appointing Julie Legrain as Administrative Manager in June, we have been forced to fundamentally restructure our events program in light of COVID, including successfully shifting our 2020 Monomer recycling forum from a physical to a virtual format. With a participation of over 150 fee-paying participants, we ensured our flagship event went ahead in 2020, showcasing with policymakers the latest developments and positions within the industry. It also enabled a unique opportunity for participants to hear the most up-to-date thinking affecting our industry from a wide variety of stakeholders directly involved in the political processes. This and other successes in events in 2020 allow us to enter 2021 confident that, in spite of the on-going COVID challenges, we can maintain and enhance our profile via a series of webinars, seminars and annual Conference throughout 2021.

Other vital administrative processes have also been established, revised and markedly improved. This includes a HR contact point for members, recruitment procedures, logistics around Board meetings, financial affairs and budgetary processes.

Petcore Europe welcomes 17 new members in 2020

So far in 2020 Petcore Europe has welcomed 17 new members: Kraft Heinz, Toyobo, AMB Packaging, Perstorp, Poseidon Plastics, EMMTEC, Omya, Recoup,  Dentis Recycling, Reifenhauser, Croda, Gr3n, Moretto, Bopet, Worn Again Technologies, Greiner Packaging, Alpla, SML and Plastic Sense Foundation (in bold are new since the last newsletter). Petcore Europe now counts 106 members and represents the PET value chain more than ever.

Welcome the new hire of the Petcore Europe team

To help Petcore Europe advance in its many WG activities, the operational team has added another member. As Stéphanie Vuong is leaving at the end of December, Raphael Jaumotte joined our team in November as new Technical Manager.  

News from our members! 

Upcoming events and meetings

January /February 2021 - Internal Webinar - Multiple Loop Recycling: What are the Challenges ?

February 3 2021 - PETCORE EUROPE General Assembly (online)

May 2021 - Communications Campaign event at European Parliament (physical)

June 1- 3 2021 - Petcore Europe Conference (physical) and Technical Committee Forum 

October 2021 -  PET Monomer Recycling Forum (physical)