Dear members,

Please find below an overview of the activities of European Bioplastics throughout March 2018. 

Regulatory Affairs (WG REGA)

With regard to the Fertilisers Regulation, the trilogues between Commission, Parliament and Council are proceeding, and the annexes will be discussed in technical meetings (which take place nearly every week). EUBP continued to meet Member States (HU, EE, ES, EL) as well as key Members of Parliament (Marc Tarabella, Frederick Federley, Andreas Schwab) in early March in order to inform about our asks on biodegradable mulch films. The main issues of the dossier (discussions on by-products, cadmium and delegated acts) are taking much of the awareness space, and widely differing positions on e.g. cadmium between Member State groups might even result in a ‘freezing of the trilogues’. We hope to be able to achieve awareness for our points and to make Council and Parliament see the meaningfulness of our technology for the prevention of microplastics in EU soil. The Parliamentary breakfast debate organised on 21 March and hosted by MEP Franc Bogovic (EPP group / Slovenia) to discuss biodegradable mulches with the trilogue parties was well received. Altogether 35 participants (60% from key institutions Commission, Parliament and Council) listened to the presentations and participated in a lively Q&A session. People stayed well over the given timeframe to discuss and mingle. We will try to mobilise the support that was apparent amongst prominent EPP group members (MEP Mairead McGuinness, MEP Angélique Delahaye, MEP Sofia Ribeiro, MEP Franc Bogovic) and to emphasise this interest towards the EP rapporteur on this file who is from the same group. We will continue to engage with stakeholders and keep you posted on any intelligence concerning an updated timeline.

The Parliament’s own-initiative report (INI) on the Plastics Strategy has been published. The rapporteur on the file is Mark Demesmaeker (ECR group / Belgium). We met with Demesmaeker on 20 March together with Erwin Lepoudre (Kaneka) who also joined in his capacity as member of the Board of Belgian Bio Packaging. The relevant shadow-rapporteurs (for the other political groups) on the file are Simona Bonafè (S&D), Anneli Jäätteenmäki (ALDE), Karl-Heinz Florenz (EPP) and Marco Affronte (Greens). In March, EUBP also finalised its position on the Plastics Strategy, which will be distributed after Easter to EP and Council contacts. We could also secure several meetings in early April with most of the shadow rapporteurs and will expand engagement to the Council. The timing for the Parliament’s process is very ambitious and is actually already slightly delayed. The Consideration in the Environment Committee will potentially also be pushed back from the original date (26 April). The Parliament will take up the oxo-report of the Commission together with its work on the Plastics Strategy.

EUBP will also engage with European Bioeconomy Alliance and suggest a ‘Bioplastics Position’ for this group in support of our lobby work.

With regard to the Commission’s initiative on Marine Litter and Single Use Plastics delays are to be expected. The necessary Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA), which the Commission needs to provide for such legislative initiatives, has been heavily criticised by the EIA Scrutiny Board, and DG Environment will need to revise it before presenting a proposal. It is questionable if the timeline (presentation of proposal in May) can still be fulfilled.

WG REGA will meet next on 10 April in Brussels. 

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

Product Groups

Product Group Biobased

EUBP participated in a workshop of a German project on bio-based food packaging commissioned by the Federal Ministry of Food and Agriculture. Together with several retailers, the main discussion points were sustainability, consumer acceptance and material performance. The outcome of the project will be laid down in a report, which will be published in summer 2018.

Task Force (TF) 1 (Sustainability evaluation) is currently developing a concept paper on the purpose of bio-based plastics. The summary of publically available LCA data for bioplastics was finalised and will now be reviewed by the group.

TF 2 (End of life) is currently preparing fact sheets on relevant end-of-life options for bio-based plastics, starting with mechanical recycling and incineration. The TF will have a conference call on 19 April to discuss the progress.

TF 3 (Chemicals and intermediates) had a web meeting on 23 March to discuss the second draft of the mapping of existing building blocks for bioplastics. The mapping will now be used to prepare a background paper, which should be finalised in summer.

The next meeting of the PG Biobased will be on Thursday 28 June, one day after the members meeting, from 9-11am.

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

Product Group Biodegradables

The PG is currently revising the background paper on EN13432 certified plastics in industrial composting plants and will update the meta study about the behaviour of bioplastic films in mechanical recycling in the coming weeks. With regard to the oxo-favourable legislation in Saudi Arabia, the PG will send a letter to the responsible authorities.

The next meeting of the PG Biodegradables will be on Thursday 28 June, one day after the members meeting, from 11am-1pm.

For more information regarding biodegradable and compostable plastics and the work of the PG please, contact Constance Ißbrücker (issbruecker@european-bioplastics.org).

Working Group Standardisation

EUBP participated in the national mirror committee of CEN/TC 249 WG 24 on 14 March. The main focus of the meeting was to discuss a new Technical Report (ISO/TR 21960) “Plastics in the environmental – Current state of knowledge and methodologies”, which has a special focus on microplastics. International comments can be submitted until 16 April. EUBP is now an official delegate for WG 24 “Environmental aspects”. The next meeting of the European committee will be on 19 April (web meeting).

CEN/TC 261/SC 4/ WG 2 is currently preparing an standard on the home compostability of plastic carrier bags and will meet on 17 April in Saint Denis, France to further discuss the first draft of the document.

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

Communications

Please find in the following link a selection of relevant media clippings from March 2018.

In case you missed the March issue of our ‘Bioplastics Bulletin’, you can read it here.

New publications: EUBP recently developed a discussion paper on the benefits of biodegradable plastics and the role these materials in a circular economy. The paper explains the added value of compostable plastics for efficient waste collection and resource management, and it highlights a number of key applications where biodegradable plastics can provide particular benefits, such as bio-waste bags, coffee capsules and tea bags, or fruit labels. The discussion paper can be downloaded from our website and is also available in German.

The Working Group Communications is currently gathering funding to produce a series of short animated video clips on bioplastics. The videos will be used online and on social media and are aimed at the general and interested public in order to correct some of the most common misunderstandings about bioplastics. The funding needed for the videos is €30-40,000. The project will be financed through contributions from our members. We therefore kindly ask you to check and indicate whether you can contribute budget towards the realisation of this project.

For more information on the video project, or in case you have any questions concerning the communications activities of EUBP, please contact Katrin Schwede (schwede@european-bioplastics.org).

Events

The registration for the 13th European Bioplastics Conference taking place on 4/5 December 2018 at the Titanic Chaussee Hotel in Berlin will open in April 2018.

The Call for Papers was distributed in March 2018, and the first proposals have been submitted. If you would like to have the opportunity to speak, please download the presentation proposal template on our website. We especially encourage proposals on the following topics:

• bio-based and/or biodegradable polymers – latest material and process innovations,
• packaging innovations, especially food contact solutions,
• additives for biopolymers,
• mechanical recycling of bioplastics,
• Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) of bioplastics,
• new (durable) applications introduced in 2018,
• sneak preview 2019 – product and material pre-launch, and
• the bioplastics policy and market developments in the EU and beyond.

The deadline to submit an abstract is 31 July 2018. We also invite proposals for poster presentations giving researchers and new projects the opportunity to visualise their work and preliminary results in the fields of biopolymer research, packaging, and building blocks. If you would like to contribute a poster presentation, please contact us to receive the template.

If you would like more information about the European Bioplastics Conference or discuss how to get involved this year, please get in touch with Joanna Wilde (wilde@european-bioplastics.org).  

Research Projects

EUBP has updated their website and you can now find detailed information about all on-going project involvements.

For the on-going PolyBioSkin project, the consortium has submitted all deliverables that were due in February. EUBP is currently working on the projects exploitation and dissemination strategy, which will be a key focus of the next project consortium meeting at the end of April, hosted by EUBP.

With the 2018 BBI H2020 Call for proposals opening in April, EUBP is actively looking for cooperations and consortium involvements, especially for proposals responding to calls under Strategic Orientations (SO) 3 (Develop innovative bio-based products for identified market applications) and SO4 (Create and accelerate the market-uptake of bio-based products and applications).

EUBP will be participating in the upcoming BBI JU Info Day in Brussels on 17 April, which should be of great relevance for all organisations looking to broaden their project related network and explore consortium involvements in upcoming calls.

If you would like to discuss project cooperations or find our more about our currently on-going projects, please get in touch with Götz Ahrens (ahrens@european-bioplastics.org).

EUBP is member of the advisory board of the BiNa (Biokunststoffe nachhaltig/ Bioplastics sustainable). On 13 March, a political evening of the project took place in Berlin, and EUBP was presenting on the current EU Plastics Strategy. The project consortium gave an overview on the latest results on bioplastics LCA and consumer awareness and communication. The final event of the project is planned for 25 April in Hanover. For more information please contact issbruecker@european-bioplastics.org.

Planned activities April 2018

• WG Regulatory Affairs: engagement with EP and Council on Fertilisers Regulation; finalise position on Plastics Strategy (including oxo-report) and start engagement programme.
• Update Feedstock paper and development of concept paper (TF1)
• Position regarding bioplastics LCA (TF1)
• Development Fact Sheet Mechanical Recycling and Incineration (TF2)
• Background Paper on bio-based building blocks (TF3)
• Update of the next draft on the Background Paper on compostable plastics and the recycling meta study (PG Biodegradables)
• CEN committee meetings (CEN /TC 261/SC4/WG2 and CEN/TC 249/WG24)

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