Beverage bottlers slam EU’s draft reuse targets a €19B “existential threat”

27 Oct 2022 --- European beverage associations are rallying against what they deem “disproportionate and unjustified” plastic bottle reuse targets recently proposed by the European Commission (EC) for the upcoming revision of the Packaging and Packaging Waste Directive (PPWD). The associations assert the draft measures would inflict “astronomically high” costs and put numerous SMEs out of business.

The European Fruit Juice Association, The Brewers of Europe, Natural Mineral Waters Europe and UNESDA Soft Drinks Europe, have united in expressing their “profound concern” that proposed mandatory reuse targets for beverage packaging at 20% by 2030 and 75% by 2040 would dismantle the recycling infrastructure industry has invested in and developed for years. 

Nicholas Hodac, director general of UNESDA, tells PackagingInsights he is perplexed by the EC’s U-turn. “Frankly, we are disappointed the EC is asking us to shift exclusively toward one type of solution and, to our knowledge, without even having conducted a proper environmental impact assessment and a cost-analysis assessment of what such a transformational business model change involves,” he says. 

However, groups like Greenpeace say recycling “will never work” and have called for an end to single-use plastic production in favor of reusable or refillable systems. They say that ending fossil-fuel-based material reliance is critical to achieving global climate change targets.

Larissa Copello, Zero Waste Europe (ZWE) consumption and production campaigner in charge of the PPWD, tells us recent ZWE studies show plastics, glass and cardboard are far from circular.

“The truth is that we cannot recycle our way out of this huge mess. We’re living one crisis after the other – from climate, pollution, energy and resource depletion – and the only way to solve this altogether is by addressing our current production and consumption habits at source. Civil society, businesses, municipalities as well as Member States are calling for reuse at the European level. It is crucial that the proposal for the revision of the PPWD sets high and strong binding reuse targets, which is the only way to drive investments in the right direction,” she asserts.

There are doubts over the environmental benefits of reuse systems.How climate-friendly is reuse?
The associations call into question the environmental benefits of reuse systems. 

According to a recent report by PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), reusable beverage packaging has additional environmental costs compared to single-use recyclable packaging. 

“This is due to increased utility consumption from operating additional machinery and washing bottles and higher fuel consumption from increased logistical complexity,” explains Hodac. 

“A completely new set-up is required for returning empty bottles and crates from the retailer (possibly through a wholesaler) back to the original bottler, rather than collecting shredded plastic for recycling.” 

“We don’t deny the evidence: recycling is a key circularity pillar. It allows us to recover our packaging and use it multiple times in a closed-loop system, which considerably reduces the demand for virgin resources,” continues Hodac. 

In several European countries like the Nordics, the recycling rate of beverage packaging is over 80%, and all EU countries are on a path to achieving a minimum of 90% collection by the end of this decade, according to UNESDA. 

An economic blow? 
The associations emphasize that the EC’s U-turn would render years of infrastructural development, research and investment obsolete. The PwC report estimates a shift to 20% reusable beverage packaging for the soft drinks sector alone would cost upwards of €19 billion (US$19.1 billion). “We cannot imagine what the cost will be to move toward 75% by 2040,” says Hodac. 

“The introduction of high reuse targets for beverage packaging would be incoherent vis-à-vis the strong policy signals already provided by the EU Single-Use Plastic Directive to go in the direction of recyclability, collection and recycled content.” 

“It would therefore annihilate the tremendous efforts and investments that our sector is taking to achieve packaging circularity by making our packaging recyclable, increasing its collection and incorporating a high amount of recycled content in our packaging,” he continues.  Consumer compliance with reuse and refill schemes could be difficult to enforce.

Industry aims to use a minimum of 50% recycled content in PET bottles by 2025 and produce PET bottles made of 100% recycled PET or renewable material by 2030. However, market pricing, bureaucracy and a lack of needed facilities severely hinder these aims – something UNESDA has also said could destroy numerous SMEs.  

“The EC’s current proposal to focus exclusively on reuse puts into question all the strategies toward collection and recycling. It disregards that reuse is not, and should not, be the exclusive solution to achieve circularity. The EC should look at reuse as a complementary measure to reducing and recycling packaging waste – when it delivers environmental benefits,” stresses Hodac. 

The consumer compliance problem 
Hodac says the EC’s reuse proposals rest on unjustified assumptions regarding consumer engagement. Currently, the deposit return schemes (DRS) being established throughout Europe offer monetary incentives for consumers to return and recycle waste PET bottles. 

“Reusable beverage systems will only be successful if significant consumer engagement and behavioral change exist. Consumers need to be encouraged to purchase this kind of packaging, and they need to be willing to give back the consumed packaging so it can be recovered and put back into the system,” he says. 

“We all know that cultural differences play an important role as well. Consumer acceptance will certainly take a long time in some parts of Europe.”

“Reuse is not, and should not, be the exclusive solution to achieve circularity. The EC should look at reuse as a complementary measure to reducing and recycling packaging waste – when it delivers environmental benefits,” Hodac concludes. 

By Louis Gore-Langton