Biodegradable plastics are not a silver bullet against pollution, concludes European Parliament vote

14 Sep 2018 --- Biodegradable and compostable plastics do not prevent plastic pollution and should not be an excuse to keep consuming single-use plastics, the European Parliament recognized in a vote on Wednesday. The Parliament voted to strengthen the European Commission’s plans to slash plastic pollution, under the European Strategy for Plastics in a Circular Economy launched in January 2018. The move has been welcomed by green groups such as Friends of the Earth.

Speaking on behalf of the Rethink Plastic alliance, ECOS program manager Ioana Popescu said: “Biodegradable or not, plastics are clogging our land and oceans, threatening the health of humans and animals. The Parliament today has acknowledged that biodegradable plastics are not a silver bullet to our plastic pollution crisis, but merely a distraction from real solutions. Policies that dramatically cut our plastic footprint need to be urgently implemented.”

The European Parliament called for a number of additional measures that go beyond the Commission’s original proposals, including:
•    A ban on microplastics in cosmetics, personal care products, detergents and cleaning products by 2020, and concrete measures to tackle other sources of microplastics;
•    A complete ban on oxo-degradable plastics – a source of microplastic pollution – by 2020;
•    The reduction of hazardous substances in plastics, to ensure that what is recycled is free from dangerous chemicals;
•    That the priority should be to prevent plastic waste from being produced in the first place, followed by reuse and recycling, with landfill or incineration of plastic waste as a last resort.

However, the European Parliament failed to back measures to tackle widespread pollution from plastic pellets, which are melted down to make everyday plastic items. It also failed to support stronger economic incentives to reduce plastic production and consumption.

The European Commission has already begun to implement some measures announced in its Plastics Strategy, notably a proposal on legislation to reduce marine pollution from single-use plastics and fishing gear, currently being discussed both in the European Parliament and by national governments.

The European Parliament’s report on the European Strategy for Plastics, which was adopted yesterday by the plenary testifies to the increasing acknowledgement and endorsement of the value propositions of bioplastics. Rapporteur Mark Demesmaeker highlights the potential role of bio-based plastics and of biodegradable plastics in establishing a strong circular EU bioeconomy. 

“We welcome the emphasis on the potential of bio-based plastics for feedstock differentiation in plastics production as well as the acknowledgment of the transformative role of innovative bio-based plastics already in the market,” comments Hasso von Pogrell, Managing Director of European Bioplastics (EUBP). “Equally important to us is the express call of the Parliament for defining clear criteria for the use of biodegradable and compostable plastics. With regard to food packaging applications, this will boost organic recycling and thus help realize a circular economy across Europe. In this context, it is also very encouraging that the Parliament is taking a clear position against oxo-degradable plastics,” von Pogrell states further.

Bioplastics offer two paradigmatic developments at opposite ends of products’ life cycles. On the one hand, bio-based plastics enable feedstock diversification and the gradual transition away from fossil and towards renewable feedstocks. This is an essential value proposition in the EU’s bid to gain independence from fossil resource imports and to significantly reduce CO2 emissions.

The other key innovation proposed by the bioplastics industry is biodegradability and compostability according to existing harmonized standard on industrial composting (EN 13432), that is, the conversion of plastic materials to water, biomass, and CO2 through microbial metabolization. Applied to food contact applications such as biowaste collection bags or food packaging, biodegradability and compostability enables the optimization of separate bio-waste collection for organic recycling, thus preserving valuable secondary resources and establishing an important aspect of the circular economy. In other environments, biodegradability can help to reduce plastic waste accumulation, for example in modern agriculture through the use of mulch films that are biodegradable in soil according to the standard EN 17033. In addition to this, there could also be selected future applications in marine contexts where items such as fishing gear are prone to being lost at sea unintentionally.

The report of the European Parliament on the Plastics Strategy ties in with earlier initiatives of the European Commission and statements of the Parliament with regard to provisions recently adopted in the Circular Economy Package as well as the Waste Framework Directive, the Packaging and Packaging Waste Directive.

“We see a more differentiated understanding evolving in the European institutions of what bioplastics are and how they can contribute to the circular bioeconomy,” assesses von Pogrell. “Especially for the property of biodegradability and compostability, it is important to clarify what is expected in which specific environment, to see for which products the property is meaningful and if standards exist or still need to be elaborated.” 

With an eye to the draft Directive on marine litter and single-use plastics, von Pogrell notes that “biodegradability may be of relevance in marine environments in specific circumstances and for specific applications, but it clearly is no general remedy to the problem of littering or a reason for the excessive production of single-use items.” EUBP calls for a differentiated approach to marine biodegradability and urges the Commission and Parliament to further assess this specific point.

EUBP is looking forward to closely working together with the EU institutions and all relevant stakeholders in the current and upcoming discussions on single-use plastics and the soon to be published update of the EU Bioeconomy Strategy.

As announced in Annex III to the “Plastics Strategy,” which was announced in January this year, an EU-wide pledging campaign for the uptake of recycled plastics is taking place.

As part of this campaign, the European Commission calls on stakeholders to come forward with voluntary pledges to boost the uptake of recycled plastics.

The objective is to ensure that by 2025, ten million tons of recycled plastics find their way into new products on the EU market.

Interested companies and industry associations can submit their pledges by filling in the template for the pledging campaign for the uptake of recycled plastics. The deadline has been extended until September 30.