Three more industry associations have joined “PolyREC” (www.polyrec.eu), a European initiative to monitor, verify and report plastics recycling and uptake data across Europe (see Plasteurope.com of 24.03.2021).

The Polyolefin Circular Economy Platform (PCEP, Brussels / Belgium; www.pcep.eu), Styrenics Circular Solutions (SCS, Brussels; www.styrenics-circular-solutions.com) and the European Manufacturers of Expanded Polystyrene (Eumeps, Brussels; www.eumeps.org) have joined founding organisations Petcore Europe (Brussels; www.petcore-europe.org), PlasticsEurope (Brussels; www.plasticseurope.org), Plastics Recyclers Europe (PRE, Brussels; www.plasticsrecyclers.eu) and VinylPlus (Brussels; www.vinylplus.eu) to support the harmonised data recording system.

PolyREC said it now combines data collection knowledge and expertise across the full PVC, polyester (PET), polyolefin, polystyrene and EPS value chains, ensuring the recorded data for recycled plastics is “comprehensive, consistent and comparable across polymers and sectors”.

“Data plays a central role in the circular economy, accelerating uptake of quality secondary raw materials by establishing trust throughout the system,” said Venetia Spencer, PCEP’s secretary general. “We all need improved metrics to monitor progress towards circularity, to underpin investment decisions and to support compliance with current and future policies. We welcome more members to accelerate progress together.”

Jürgen Lang, managing director of Eumeps, added that the system will help to showcase that EPS is already widely collected and recycled, far beyond what is generally recognised. He said, “The verified and monitored set of data will enable us to improve existing recycling schemes and better trace waste streams.”