Digimarc CEO: Digital watermarking expansion will make circular plastic economy “flourish”

23 Feb 2024 --- Digimarc Corporation has expanded the accessibility of its digital watermarking technology, Digimarc Recycle, to improve plastic waste sorting and recycling and lower virgin material use. The move follows successful pilots and testing in multiple countries worldwide.

The digital watermarking company powers precise granular sortation of plastics, increasing the opportunity for producers to purchase and repurpose higher-quality recycled plastic that can compete with virgin materials. 

Digimarc Recycle helps disincentivize the continued use of virgin plastics by producers and makes extended producer responsibility (EPR) schemes a more viable option to tackle the growing problem of plastic pollution.

Riley McCormack, Digimarc’s president and CEO, tells Packaging Insights that Digimarc Recycle is available and easily accessible for integration into new and existing recycling and sorting facilities. 

“Sorting equipment manufacturers like Pellenc ST and Tomra have already integrated Digimarc Recycle. Otherwise, existing equipment can simply and cost-effectively be modified to use our powerful and proven technology by adding a hardware module and our Digimarc Recycle software to accurately detect and identify digitally watermarked items.”

“Digimarc provides equipment manufacturers with specifications, a reference design and detection software,” says McCormack.

Deploying digital watermarking helps to create the variety, volume and quality of recycled plastics needed for a viable circular plastic economy (Image credit: Digimarc).Upgrading waste recycling 
In the US, the current ecosystem of plastic recycling does not work, as only 5–9% of plastics are fully recycled annually, which means that almost all plastics are discarded as waste. In 2021 alone, 51 million tons of plastic waste were generated, flags Digimarc. 

The company identifies the main reasons why the world struggles to recycle plastic as the number of plastic variants created by the industry and the limits of the optical sorting technology at recycling facilities. 

Plastic packaging spans a wide range of types — from food- or skin-contact-grade to industrial-use plastics — and often contains multiple materials and layers, further compounding the challenges of sorting. 

Current sorting technology can only identify, at a high level, some of the materials in each item, but it cannot determine the grade or complex composition of much of the material it works to sort, says Digimarc.

This means that existing infrastructure cannot sort based on specifications that would allow plastics to retain the value required to become truly circular — for example, determining if a plastic is food-grade. This disincentivizes producers from purchasing and using recycled plastic as they are unable to acquire the plastic varieties and specifications they need.

The “new gold”?
Digimarc Recycle links covert digital watermarks applied to plastic packaging to product information, including packaging composition, food or non-food grade plastic, product variant, brand and stock keeping unit (SKU). 

“Deploying digital watermarking, instead of solely relying on optical sortation, helps to create the variety, volume and quality of recycled plastics needed for a viable circular economy to flourish,” explains the company. Existing infrastructure cannot sort waste based on specifications that would allow plastics to retain its value.

International management consultancy Roland Berger highlights Digimarc’s technology as a sorting technology that can “substantially improve the yield and quality of recyclates” — calling recyclates the “new gold.”

Innova Market Insights identified “Digitalized Circularity” as this year’s top packaging trend. As connected tech like QR codes, NFC and digital watermarking proliferates, industry players will embrace digitalization to improve their environmental impacts, automate supply chains and avoid greenwashing litigation.

Digimarc’s digital watermarking technology makes this possible by identifying plastic packaging deterministically to any desired level of granularity, including brand, SKU, SKU-variant, batch and lot, or serialized item, none of which can be accomplished with current optical sorting technology or other proposed next-generation technologies, asserts the company. 

Boosting EPR
The application of Digimarc Recycle helps disincentivize the continued use of virgin plastics by producers. Furthermore, the technology makes EPR schemes a more viable option to tackle the growing problem of plastic pollution.

“If we want producers to buy recyclate instead of continuing to use virgin plastic, we must improve the quality of plastic output at today’s recycling facilities and offer a real opportunity for closed-loop recycling. This is where Digimarc can help,” says McCormack. 

“Digital watermarking is a powerful, proven, and incredibly affordable solution to the plastic pollution crisis, and it is available today. We can talk about potential solutions, or we can commit to action. Our offer to license our groundbreaking technology to partners around the world underscores our belief that the time to act is now.”

The technology is now available for license by qualified partners for less than US$1 per capita annually.

By Natalie Schwertheim