Dear members,

Please find below an overview of the activities of European Bioplastics throughout July 2019. 

Regulatory Affairs (WG REGA)

Revision of the Packaging Directive's essential requirements:

On 9 July, DG Environment together with consultancy Eunomia, held a second workshop of this initiative.

EUBP focussed on the following key points during the workshop:

• Keep generic definition of recycling conform to WFD Art 3 (17) so that organic recycling remains included and there is room for innovation in the ER.
• Move from biodegradability concept to compostability concept in the context of the Packaging and Packaging Waste Directive; define clear criteria and establish marking.
• Promote inclusion of renewable resources as feedstock complementary to promotion of recyclates (should Eunomia/DG ENVI suggest an inclusion of recyclates in the essential requirements); otherwise suggestion to include a new element of carbon reduction to requirements.

Stakeholder opinions & workshop development:

• About 40 stakeholders as well as the consultancy and several people of the EC were present.
• Recyclers were overrepresented, and a clear tendency was present to narrow-down the definition of recycling in the essential requirements to mechanic recycling.
• However, there were clashing opinions between food packaging and other packaging representatives (e.g. detergent bottle producers).
• Food Drink Europe as well as Europen strongly argued against a limited understanding of recycling as well as a too strong focus on promoting the use of recyclates.
• FDE as well as Europen and partially ACE as well as present EUBP members BASF and Novamont supported EUBP’s key arguments.
• All in all the discussions were quite agitated but not so much focussing on our main points. The suggested ‘changes to the ER’ prepared by Eunomia on compostable plastics were all constructively formulated and in coherence with the ‘relevance study’ also organised by Eunomia.

EUBP identified some collaboration potential with several other associations and will liaise with them in the aftermath of the workshop.

The project is due to be finalised by end of the year. A final presentation of the results is expected around mid-October. Afterwards, the results will be evaluated by DG ENVI and might be the basis for a legislative proposal by end of 2020.

Study on ‘Relevance of biodegradable plastics in a circular economy’:

EUBP provided ample input to DG Environment and consultancy Eunomia following the workshop in June on the following points:

• Criteria for when a packaging should be made from compostable plastics
• Example products
• Phase-wise approach of introduction and legislation
• Information on standardisation processes and specific details of EN 13432
• Notes on AD and home composting in connection to bioplastics

What is still missing is research on consumer education with regard to the transferability of consumer experience with one product to another. What is more, Eunomia requested an additional input end of July concerning the share of certified compostable plastics compared to non-certified (but claimed) compostable plastics put on the market in Europe. We will try to provide input with the help of our members. However, we will only be able to deliver a rough orientation in such a short timeframe and also considering the sensitivity of the information and that we only represent the major producers but not all companies (worldwide).

Another workshop is envisaged for the second week of September (tbc).

JRC project on LCA for ‘alternative feedstock for plastics production’

The position on ‘Sound LCA as basis for policy making’ drafted by PG Bio-based TF 1 in collaboration with WG REGA was very much appreciated by the Directorate General for Growth of the European Commission. According to the policy officer Laure Baillargeon, the input triggered an intense internal discussion, and DG GROW as well as JRC saw that many of the points delivered were valid. An extension is decided, but it is not clear yet for how long the project will be prolonged exactly.

We are in contact with JRC project leader Rana Pant and will get an update from him on how far the administrative extension process has progressed in our September meeting.

Single-use Plastics Directive – remaining EC actions and transposition into national law

Even though adopted, the Single-use Plastics Directive (SUP) is still of vital interest to EUBP and its members. A core action of the EC still needs to be delivered by mid of next year (mid-2020) with the (Art 12) specification of criteria what a single-use plastic product actually is. The responsible policy officer, Anna Bobo Reminj, started to define the scope of the project in late July together with the elected consultancy. We will request a meeting with her for beginning of September in order to get a detailed update and define our points of focus.

WG REGA: the July meeting of WG REGA took place on 10 July, and the next WG REGA meeting is taking place on 04 September in Brussels.

For detailed information on the work of the WG Regulatory Affairs, please contact Kristy-Barbara Lange (lange@european-bioplastics.org). 

Product Groups

Product Group Biobased

The Working Plan 2019 - 2021 and new Task Force structure for the PG Biobased was developed. It was sent out to the group in the beginning of August.

The official version of the Position paper on LCA for bioplastics has been finalised and can now be found on the EUBP website.

For more information regarding bio-based plastics including sustainability issues and the work of the PG and TFs, please contact Constance Ißbrücker (issbruecker@european-bioplastics.org).

Product Group Biodegradables

The Working Plan 2019-2021 is under development and will be sent out to the group in August.

For more information regarding PG Biodegradables, the TF Marine, and Seedling certification, please contact Constance Ißbrücker (issbruecker@european-bioplastics.org).

Working Group Standardisation

No relevant activities in the field of standardisation in July.

The next meeting of CEN/TC 261/SC4/WG 2, in which the standard for home compostable carrier bags is discussed, will take place on 20/21 August in Berlin.

For more information on standards for bioplastics, current standardisation processes, and certification of bioplastics, please contact Constance Ißbrücker (issbruecker@european-bioplastics.org).

Communications

Please find at the following link a selection of relevant media clippings from July 2019.

In July, we submitted an article for the special issue on circular economy of the German publication Handelsblatt. In the framework of the project PolyBioSkin, Götz Ahrens has contributed with an interview on bio-based diapers to an article published by Youris. Furthermore, we have provided the publication Wired Italia with market information about bioplastics.

Currently, we are working on further updating the content of the following fact sheets:

• What are bioplastics?
• Standards for bioplastics
• Bioplastic carrier bags
• Bioplastic packaging
• Renewable resources in bio-based plastics

The WG Communications’s video project has been resumed in July. The graphic designer has been working on the animation of the video clip 1, and a first version will be finished in August and send to EUBP for review.

Furthermore, the Twitter campaign, which aims at informing new elected MEP’s about the benefits of bio-based and biodegradable plastics, has been running in July with great success.

For more information or questions concerning the communications activities of EUBP, please contact Elena Cantos (cantos@european-bioplastics.org).

Events

In June, the first media co-operations to promote the European Bioplastics Conference were signed. We have currently closed partnerships with Coating International, Packaging Europe, EuropaBio, EUWID, Green Chemical Blog, Nova Institute and Packaging Journal.

The Early Bird fee for tickets to the EUBP conference has ended on 12 July. The deadline for accepting abstracts to speak at the conference was set for 31 July.

We will now start assessing the collected Speakers Proposals in order to create a program for the 14^th conference on the 3/4 of December 2019 in the Titanic Chaussee Berlin. Furthermore, we are happy to announce that we have signed our next big Gold Sponsor for this year’s conference.

Several potential sponsors have expressed their interest in this year’s event, and we are looking forward to finalise the next agreements next month.

If you would like to discuss sponsorship to promote your brand through the European Bioplastics Conference, exhibit your products and services, or otherwise be involved, please get in touch with our new Event Manager Hannah Heimann (conference@european-bioplastics.org).

Projects

In July, the newsletter of the project PolyBioSkin has been launched with the latest research milestones on bio-based diapers, beauty masks and wound dressing. The newsletter features also an interview with Hasso von Pogrell, Managing Director of European Bioplastics, an overview of the upcoming PolyBioSkin activities, and an article about the partner project ENABLING.

In order to learn more about PolyBioSkin, please visit the project’s website.

Following the kick-off of the BIOnTOP project in Valencia in June, the consortium has officially initiated its activities. The website will be available online soon. You can find out more about the project here https://cordis.europa.eu/project/rcn/222682/factsheet/en.

If you would like to learn more about the project activities, please contact Elena Cantos (cantos@european-bioplastics.org).

LINK: http://polybioskin.eu/

Planned activities

• WG Regulatory Affairs:
  • Draft answer to Council Conclusions on circular economy (together with partner associations)
  • Develop short version of ER input to Eunomia for member use
  • Provide input on consumer education and share of certified compostable plastics (in the EU) to Eunomia in the context of the study on ‘Relevance of biodegradable plastics in a Circular Economy’
  • Follow-up on new timeline for LCA study with JRC
  • Planning of EP breakfast with MEP Bogovic in September 2019
  • Draft discussion paper on feedstock for bioplastics;
  • Find potential new date for NGO workshop on feedstock for bioplastics (Sept)
• Approval of Working Plans of PG Biobased and Biodegradables 2019-2021
• Jour Fixe of the Advisory Committee of the Seedling on 9 August
• Update of fact sheets
• Layout of the fact sheet “What are bioplastics?”
• WG Communications: Continue working on video about bioplastics

If you have any suggestions regarding the content and/or format of our monthly report, please do not hesitate to share them with us. 

This email is sent to all the contacts of our member companies that we have registered in our database. If you would like to share it with further colleagues, kindly send us an email to members@european-bioplastics.org.

Kind regards,
Hasso v. Pogrell