PETpla.net Insider 01+02 / 2014

MATERIAL / RECYCLING 14 PET planet insider Vol. 15 No. 01+02/14 www.petpla.net Petcore Europe - PET Network Day What stops us improving? On November 14, 2013 PETcore Europe organised a work- shop in Brussels on the theme of recycling PET beverages bottles: How can we further enhance PET sustainability? and: What is stopping us improving recycling in the EU? This is a topical - and serious - debate which PETcore Europe was inviting us to discuss: serious from the point of view of the beverages producers, serious for the PET raw materials producers, (namely the chemical industry), seri- ous for the processors and the converters, serious too for the bottlers and ultimately for the consumers – i.e. the entire supply chain. Agreement existed – in princi- ple and at this workshop – that no company on the planet will have the luxury of sitting back and watching as PET bottles end up in landfill, whilst precious, new and non-sustainable resources such as oil/gas – the basic materials for PET – are relentlessly exploited to produce new goods. The public do not just point the finger at PET, but regularly lambaste it as the guilty party par excellence, respon- sible for the widespread pollution of nature (the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans in particular are held up as examples). Even worse is the ubiqui- tous epidemic of plastic waste which contaminates our urban environment. The conflict of interests between the needs of industry, society and nature can be resolved by active recy- cling, i.e. by consistently collecting the used bottles and using the recycled material to make new products. All this the insiders and experts know all too well, but it still does not stop the endless arguments about how to implement these virtuous poli- cies. It’s not just about methods of collection, or the technologies and the processes used in the prepara- tion of PET but the more complex implications for health involved in PET recycling. Should there be a voluntary approach or is legal compulsion the way forward? It’s also about national culture and rationality – northern Europe takes a very different view of such matters from Mediterranean countries for example. For regions as different as the USA and Africa, the approach is even starker. Can we, should we consider countries which have already implemented policies, such as Switzerland and Japan and see how they go about things? All this provides a huge amount of ammunition for the PETcore Europe workshop, with the core objective of sharing experience amongst the play- ers in the European PET supply chain. It might be dismissed as a another mere talking shop, but without events such as PET Network Day nothing at all is going to happen. This is why Petcore Europe – with Chairman Rob- erto Bertaggia and Executive Director Patrick Peuch at the helm – presented those assembled in the Auditorium with the agenda for PET Network Day, a mixture of interesting, informa- tive and even entertaining topics from the world of PET – at the same time directing the focus in a rapid and com- pelling manner to the recyclability of PET, to the practicalities of recycling and to the problems associated with it. Patrick Peuch‘s introductory words of welcome may be regarded as embodying the image and organisa- tion of PETcore Europe: Petcore is the body representing the interests of four leading industry sector associations plus several individual companies in Brussels. To quote: ”PETcore Europe is the voice of the PET industry in by Wolfgang von Schroeter