European Commission to improve the uptake of recycled content

The European Commission is developing options for the calculation, verification and reporting of recycled content.

Its Directorate-General for Environment has just commissioned consultancy firm Eunomia to carry out a new study on this topic. Landbell Group company European Recycling Platform (ERP) participated at a recent online stakeholder workshop hosted by Eunomia, where the outline of the study and the working packages were discussed.

The goal of the study is to assist the Commission in developing a set of options to:

• develop a general method for the calculation, verification and reporting of recycled content of plastic products;
• refine the general method for single-use plastic beverage bottles, i.e. rules for the calculation, verification and reporting of recycled content that could be directly used in formulating the implementing acts of the Single-Use Plastics (SUP) Directive; and
• adapt the method to other relevant policy areas.

The study is triggered by the European Green Deal and the new Circular Economy Action Plan which both make commitments to increase the recycling of plastics, boost the uptake of recycled content and, thereby, reduce the use of virgin materials.

The project will run over the next two years. Three additional stakeholder workshops are planned for March, June, and September 2021 which ERP will contribute to and attend.