#Recycling / Circular Economy

2022-11-10

Third-party accreditations underline Berry's recycling commitment

As part of its commitment to support customers in the drive towards a circular economy and reduction in carbon footprint, Berry Global’s European flexible films division is adopting a standard approach to substantiate its recycled content claims, including for its Sustane® range of premium sustainable polymers made from 100% recycled plastic.

Berry is obtaining independent accreditation via EUCertPlast and RecyClass to ensure complete integrity, consistency, transparency, traceability and accurate accounting.

The third-party accreditations will provide customers with full reassurance as to the quality and authenticity of the recycled content present in Berry products. They form a key part of the company’s ambitious target to include at least 30% recycled content across its flexible films product range by 2025, as well as the group-wide commitment to include at least 10% post-consumer recycled (PCR) in all its packaging products by the same date.

“As the use of recycled material increases across Europe, third party accreditation will play a vital role in ensuring the necessary transparency and consistency,” commented Tony Nawar. VP Sustainability, Strategy & Innovation, Berry Packaging Solutions. “This is why we are actively accrediting both our sites and our products through recognised and respected bodies.”

EUCertPlast certification, which works to the European Standard EN 15343:2007, confirms that best practices are being followed throughout the recycling process for pre- and post-consumer waste. It covers stock management of incoming waste, the recycling process, quality management, staff training and qualifications, traceability in the supply chain and environmental protection. For complete customer peace of mind, the chain of custody provides full details of the origins of the waste material and the waste management company from which it was sourced.

Berry’s three recycling operations at Heanor and Dumfries in the UK, and Steinfeld in Germany, have already achieved EUCertPlast accreditation for all the different recycled grades produced across these facilities, including the market leading Sustane®. The remainder of the company’s flexible film manufacturing and recycling facilities are currently undergoing the accreditation process.

RecyClass, which also works to EN 15343:2007, is a comprehensive cross-industry initiative that advances plastic packaging recyclability and ensures traceability and transparency of recycled plastic content in Europe. RecyClass recycled content certification provides independent confirmation of the reliability of recycled content claims for individual products, again delivering customer reassurance.

Berry products which have already achieved RecyClass certification include Sustane® Form Fill and Seal Petro products manufactured at its site in Hardenberg, the Netherlands.

“The availability of high-quality circular resins is critical to companies as they seek to introduce more sustainable packaging to satisfy legislative requirements and consumer demand,” said Tony Nawar.

“By committing to independent, third-party accreditations for all our recycled materials, we can effectively demonstrate their quality and validity as we work with our customers in the development of appropriate solutions.”

For more information about Berry Circular Polymers, visit:

https://www.berryglobal.com/en/sustainability/berry-circular-polymers.

Berry and Glatfelter name new nonwovens heavyweight Magnera

Berry Global Group, Inc. (NYSE: BERY) and Glatfelter Corporation (NYSE: GLT) announced that the proposed merger of Berry's Health, Hygiene and Specialties Global Nonwovens and Films (“HHNF”) business with Glatfelter progressed further today with the creation of the Magnera brand (pronounced ‘Mag-nair-uh’), a global leader in the specialty materials industry.

Ence and ShareTex begin initial testing of the ATENEA innovation project to promote textile recycling in Spain

Ence and ShareTex are making progress on the Atenea R&D project, which aims to develop a complete value chain for textile recycling in Spain. Specifically, the goal of the ATENEA project—which is funded by the Center for Technological Development and Innovation (CDTI)—is to connect all the necessary stages for the recovery of textile waste, from collection and management, through recycling and transformation into new raw materials, to their incorporation into new textile products.

DePoly Inaugurates its Showcase Plant in Monthey Switzerland

What if used plastic bottles, PET packaging material and polyester textiles could become raw materials just as high performing as virgin resources? That is the ambition of DePoly, a circular materials company based in Sion, Switzerland which inaugurated its Showcase Plant in Monthey on July 6th & 7th. The first depolymerization facility of its kind and scale in Switzerland, this industrial Showcase Plant represents a major milestone in the company's growth and its journey toward commercialization.

Commission clarifies rules on plastic bottles recycling

The European Commission today adopted new rules on recycling of single-use plastic beverage bottles made primarily of polyethylene terephthalate (PET bottles). These rules establish, for the first time, a methodology to calculate, verify and report chemically recycled content. This is part of the Commission’s December 2025 plastics package.

DyStar releases FY2025 sustainability report, marking a new milestone towards its 2030 targets

DyStar, a leading specialty chemicals company with more than a century of expertise in product development and innovation, today announced the release of its FY2025 Sustainability Report, marking a significant milestone in its sustainability journey and reinforcing its commitment to long-term value creation.

TERIS reaches milestone: Fraunhofer consortium develops new standards for tire analysis

In the “TERIS” project, the Fraunhofer institutes ICT, IGD, and IWM—led by the Fraunhofer Institute for Structural Durability and System Reliability LBF—have reached a decisive milestone. For the first time, the teams aim to generate, analyse, and predict tire wear in the laboratory in a standardized and practical manner. As part of this milestone, results are now available on reference abrasion, particle analysis, tribological models, AI-based surface analysis, a test bench concept, and methods for accelerated aging and VOC detection. The tire industry, testing services, and environmental agencies will in future benefit from reliable, rapid laboratory procedures for emissions assessment.