Plastic garbage in the ocean, in animal carcasses, and even in our food chain plastic has a bad Image. The feel of the plastic industry and now wants to focus more on Recycling. Real u-turn, or Marketing?
Mobile phones, Laptops, Shoe soles, car seats, vacuum cleaners, SURGICAL appliances, drain pipes, office chairs, plastic is an indispensable part of our everyday life. “Plastic has great properties, you can shape anything out of him, he is durable, a little brittle – it provides no other Material,” says Rolf Buschmann. Bushman is certainly not a “plastic-Disciples”, on the contrary. The chemist, works for the environmental organization BUND and is the author of the plastic Atlas 2019. This highlights the negative impact of the “super material plastic”.
Due to its extreme durability, plastic has become a worldwide Problem Since the 1950’s, around 86 million tons of plastic are estimated to be in the oceans landed. Animals eating plastic waste or becoming entangled in it and perish. Even in the Arctic it snows plastic particles and in the soil can be found, depending on the Region of four to twenty times more micro-plastics than in the world’s oceans.
Plastic waste in the sea – the plastic vortex in the Pacific is four times as large as the area of Germany
Against this Background, the Slogan “Plastics Shape the Future sounds” – “- plastic shaping the future” – almost like a threat. It is the Motto presented to the the Association of the European plastics industry at the world’s largest trade fair for the plastics industry, the K 2019, in Düsseldorf, Germany. One of the “Hot Topics” this year: the circular economy. So there is a change of Awareness in the industry?
“The market is asking for sustainability”
“The biggest mistake in the case of Recycling is not to recycle,” says Mikko Koivuniemi of Fortum Waste Solutions. The Finnish company manufactures consumer-waste recycled plastic. Them in flower pots or drain might be caused to the pipes. “The market requires sustainable packaging and products, the demand is huge – it fills our order books.”
Also, the manufacturers of sorting and recycling plants benefit from the increasing demand. “Overall, we have been in the plastic industry, while a slowdown in economic growth, but in the case of recycling machines, the business is going really well. Generally speaking, more and more plastic to come to the processors on the machine Builder and want equipment that can also work with recycled materials,” reports Thorsten Kühmann, managing Director of the Verband Deutscher Maschinen – und Anlagenbau (VDMA).
Everything’s so nice and green here, plastic recyclate, the company Fortum Waste Solutions
So far has been: Recycled resins, recycled plastics, are more expensive and cannot be processed as variable as new plastic. But in the meantime, the industry was advised by the negative Image of plastic under considerable pressure, therefore, the interest in recycled material, increases Kühmann confirmed. Added to policy guidelines. So is recycled in Europe by 2025, four times more plastic in products Vera be processed than it is today. However, the EU Commission relies on voluntary commitment of the companies, instead of binding laws. Kühmann calls for a clear quota, which regulates the use of recycled materials in new plastic products.
Non-Recycle as a waste of energy
In fact, it looks so far in terms of plastic Recycling in Europe rather mau. In Germany alone, more than 6 million tons of plastic waste were produced in 2017. However, only 16 percent of them were real, material recycling material processed, the majority of the plastic waste was burned or in other countries.
Most of the energy by Recycling back to win
Here, Recycling offers the best energy balance. Here you win a good two-thirds of the source energy of the product, when Burned, however, just a quarter. Why, then, is not recycling much more plastic?
The trade determines the packaging
More than 30 percent, of the processed plastics according to the German Federal environment Agency (UBA) as the packaging. Here, too, the manufacturers want to use more Recyclates, but it is not always easy, says Oliver möllenstädt from the General Association of the plastics processing industry (GKV). “Especially in the case of food packaging is to be agreed with the difficult Standards set by the European food safety Agency.”
The strict rules are intended to prevent the harmful chemical additives made from recycled plastic move may be on food. Because the recycling of Altplastik usually different materials are mixed, and pollutants can be concentrated in the recovered recyclate.
However, most of the other products that are in plastic packaging sold and also because the packaging industry is doing with Recycling innovations difficult. Möllenstädt defended his division. To illustrate “the relations of forces: The packaging industry consists primarily of small and medium-sized companies. In the trade, but Europe dominate – up to worldwide corporations. In this respect, it is clear who decides at the end whether innovations come in the market or not.”
Already at the Design at the circuit thinking
Also, the Recycling expert, Franziska Krüger from the German Federal environment Agency confirmed The trade make the packers a lot of specifications to optimize about the logistics.
Although there is in the plastic industry movement towards more Recycling, says Kruger, but it could be done a lot more. “Of circular economy, not to speak, only since yesterday.”
But so far, every division of the industry has thought only of their own field of activity. For more Recycling need to link up the individual areas more. So it should already be in the product design to the Recycling of thought calls for the UBA expert, about the coloring. “Light-colored or colorless plastics are better to recycle than coloured and dark. Because your Recycling a grey recyclate, which can only be dyed darker, as a rule.” The use of the area for such a dark recycled material is lower than for brighter recycled.
With bioplastics against the plastic of hunger?
However, not only the images of whales with plastic bags in the stomach, or Reports about micro-plastic in the human body put the industry under pressure. Significantly more Recycling could also be used by a completely different development: The global plastic demand is growing rapidly and could double, according to a study by the information service, IHS, Markit, up to the year 2030: the last 185 million to 400 million tons per year. If the promotion would be throttled fossil fuels such as petroleum, until then, in fact, clearly, to stop global warming, would be significantly less raw material for plastic production.
Bioplastics from renewable raw materials such as wood, Corn, sugar beet or potatoes, could not satisfy the huge plastic hunger, says Manfred Santen, a chemist at Greenpeace. In the face of a steadily growing world population, there is a strong competition for food production.
Bio-plastics can’t solve the plastic problem, experts say
Plastic Recycling alone is not enough
And chemical Recycling, in which, by chemical decomposition of Altplastik the starting materials recovered shall be, according to Buschmann is still no effective method. The energetic effort is, at least currently, is still much too high, says the FEDERAL chemist.
In front of each Recycling should be a fundamental question – the experts of the FEDERAL government, Greenpeace and UBA agree: How to create products that are as durable and avoid waste? Rolf Buschmann puts it this way: “at Least when it comes to packaging, we are in need of a radical concept change. Once the plastic has to be the exception, and returnable to the rule.”