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President, PET Packaging Association for Clean Environment
The last decade has seen awareness around environment and sustainability with United Nations Environment Division driving the agenda on rethinking plastics for a circular economy along with support from Ellen MacArthur Foundation, which jointly instituted New Plastics Economy Initiative in 2015. The initiative drives a host of collaborative projects with consumer good companies, plastic producers, packaging manufacturers to meet the objective that plastic never becomes waste or leads to pollution.
A circular economy for plastics is rooted in innovation to ensure all plastic packaging can be reduced, reused or recycled, in practice to ensure their circulation in the economy and out of the environment.
With a policy thrust on a circular economy, it becomes important to acknowledge the power of recycling and throw light on a special plastic called Polyethylene Terephthalate (PET). PET plastic packaging can be made not only from its virgin grade but also from recycled PET (rPET). This not only recaptures the energy, but also translates into numerous life cycles for PET plastic bottles.
By virtue of its excellent oxygen barrier properties, light weight, easy processing, low carbon footprint, PET is an excellent choice for packaging drinking water, beverages, dairy, edible oil, personal care and wellness items. PET plastic is free from Bisphenol A (BPA), phthalates as well as any other endocrine-disrupting chemicals and is safe for food contact applications as approved by the US FDA.
PET plastic can be transformed into bottles but can also be upcycled into polyester fibre thence fabric, which is much more valuable than a PET bottle. This upcycling and reincarnation of discarded PET bottles into polyester fabric, yarn or film contributes to a sustainable and circular economy for plastics, as there is no spillover into the environment.
Today, PET bottles touch the lives of numerous people globally via their upcycled avatars in the form of t-shirts, scarves, jackets, carpets, reusable shopping bags, car upholstery, sleeping pillows, quilts, Jeans, furniture items and the like. Recycling is also a pathway to mitigate contamination of water bodies and reduce risk to marine life through effective waste management.
In India, under the able leadership of Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi, the Ministry of Environment was instrumental in running the visionary campaign of “Swachh Bharat”, the country’s most robust cleanliness campaign. Apart from the Swachh Bharat Abhiyaan, the Waste to Wealth Mission spearheaded by India’s Principal Scientific Advisor, which focused on development of modern technologies for waste treatment, brought a sea change in the approach to dealing with various forms of waste, including plastics.
The PET packaging and recycling ecosystem in terms of GDP value is an astounding Rs 7.5 lakh crore and the industry is also one of the largest employment generators in the country, with an employment footprint exceeding 70 lakh. It is no wonder then that over 50 per cent of rag pickers’ earnings come from collecting used PET products. PET is also most economical in terms of its production, transportation and recycling than any other packaging material.
Although India continues to invest in recycling technologies, stronger solutions in terms of policies to create an industrial environment conducive to recycling are required to achieve Net Zero target, where the amount of greenhouse gas produced, and the amount removed from the atmosphere is balanced. There is a need for greater investments in recycling plants and consolidation of existing rules to harmonize efforts to have a unified policy on the unhindered use of PET across states as well as generating more awareness on benefits of PET, which is in line with government’s massive push to eliminate single-use plastics.
Considering Agenda 2030 and India’s commitment to SDG 12 through initiatives in environmentally sound waste management rooted in reuse and recycling, PET packaging material will need to be seen from a new prism of green economy. A combination of renewable energy use and the inclusion of PET/rPET can enable India to meet carbon neutrality commitments in line with the larger vision of a circular economy.
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Views expressed above are the author's own.
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