Policy and reports

The Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA) has released a project report looking at levels of plastic contamination in food waste destined for compost sites in light of its introduction of stricter contamination limits. The report makes a series of recommendations for domestic and commercial food waste to tackle contamination in feedstocks.

This statistical release relates to the management of ‘waste from households’, local authority collected waste and household waste in England for the 2018 calendar year and for the 2018/19 financial year. The official England ‘waste from households’ recycling rate for 2018/19 was 45.1 per cent, up 0.3 per cent from 2017.

BBIA outlines its response to BEIS and Defra’s consultation on standards for biodegradable, compostable and bio-based plastics, including the environmental impacts of producing bio-based plastics and the time and conditions necessary for these materials to biodegrade.

The Plastic Atlas provides facts, data and figures to paint a picture of the impact of plastic use across the globe, and acts as a call to action to reduce the production and consumption of the problem material for the good of the planet and its environment.

The report prepared by Ricardo Energy and Environment for the Biomass Biorefinery Network looks at the state of the market for plastics in the UK bioeconomy. The report summarises the current scale and types of compostables on the UK market, how the market for compostable plastics could grow in the medium term, identification of suitable biomass resources that could be used as feedstocks and the potential contribution of compostable plastics to the UK Plastics Pact targets for 2025, including for 100 per cent of packaging to be recyclable, reusable or compostable and for 70 per cent of all packaging to be recycled or composted.

BBIA outlines its response to the UK Government’s Resources and Waste Strategy, including the potential for the uptake of compostable materials and support for the mandatory separate collection of food waste.

Brussels 22 October 2018
The outcome report of the EU Bioeconomy conference held in Brussels on 22 October 2018, attended by more than 500 participants. The event was held following the publication of the new Bioeconomy Strategy on 11 October and looks at how the strategy can unleash the potential of the bio-based sectors to modernise Europe’s economy.

The consequential increase in bio-based plastic packaging and the expected rise of new types of materials entering the recycling streams led the German Ministry of Food and Agriculture (BMEL) to initiate a study on the disposal, sorting, and recycling of bio-based plastics, in particular of PLA, an innovative polymer that is 100 percent bio-based, very versatile, and especially suitable for packaging applications.

Green Alliance analyses how adding ‘pull’ measures to existing policy would address market failures and encourage better product design and materials management for three materials that are fundamental to the economy: plastic, steel and critical raw materials.