PUBLIC-PRIVATE INNOVATION FOR THE SUSTAINABILITY OF FOOD PACKAGING

PUBLIC-PRIVATE INNOVATION FOR THE SUSTAINABILITY OF FOOD PACKAGING

FOOD PACKAGING: REDUCE, REUSE, RECYCLE

The future of the food packaging industry, which met in Lisbon last September at the Sustainable Packaging Summit, leads towards the circular economy. The political and regulatory pressure of the European Union and the growing environmental awareness of consumers are leading it to follow the path marked by the three words that defined the environmental movement in the 80s and 90s: reduce, reuse, recycle. A path that in the XXI century translates into the acceleration of the transition towards more sustainable food packaging and the development and implementation of new research and innovation strategies.

This is the path followed by the Smart Specialisation Platform, promoted by the European Commission and the Packaging Cluster, in which 22 clusters from 11 countries participate. The main objectives of this platform are to strengthen business competitiveness by improving the efficiency of production processes; consolidating Europe as a pole of knowledge; and promote emerging economic activities based on research, creativity and innovation.

One of the areas in which innovation will be crucial is precisely the recycling of food packaging. In this specific area, systemic change will only be possible through public-private collaboration, which translates into partnerships between brands, waste management companies, local authorities and technology companies. These strategic partnerships are essential for future investments in new recycling technologies to move the industry forward on the path to sustainability.

PUBLIC-PRIVATE PARTNERSHIPS

A good example of these partnerships between the public and private sectors is the collaboration of the Generalitat Valenciana and the multinational Nestlé to recover and recycle plastic containers, mainly coffee capsules, one of the most consumed beverages on the planet. In Spain, 7 out of 10 Spaniards use coffee capsules daily and, worldwide, 39,000 capsules are produced every minute, 70% of which end up in landfills, making the consumption of this popular drink a real environmental problem.

The collaboration agreement includes the installation of an ECOPICK artificial intelligence robot from PICVISA in the Picassent light packaging selection plant, located south of the metropolitan area of the city of Valencia. The objective of this initiative is to separate and classify small plastic waste that can be recycled. In this case, plastic coffee capsules, plastic lids and yogurt containers, which will be diverted to treatment and recycling plants to turn them into a new resource and favor a sustainable system that contributes to a more circular economy.

PACKAGING RECOVERY AND RECYCLING

For these examples and others similar to be extended and replicable in all types of food packaging waste, technological innovation also has to influence the design, so that these containers are fully recyclable and reusable. On the one hand, food packaging must meet a long list of requirements (separability, cleanliness, labelling and colouring). On the other hand, it is also necessary to introduce reuse criteria in the design, using more resistant materials that support washing and sterilization.

Increasing the reuse of food packaging is an essential battle to optimize resources and drastically reduce waste generation. Some sectors, such as cosmetics and home care, have opted for the concept of reuse-refilling with containers prepared for repeated and prolonged use. An example is found in Norway, where the Orkla brand has developed a sustainable refill container for its liquid soap and laundry detergent products.

INNOVATION AND NEW PACKAGING MATERIALS

The sustainability of food packaging also involves innovation through the use of new materials. An upward trend is the use of bioplastics to replace fossil-fuel-based plastics. And another is the use of paper as an ideal substitute for plastic packaging, even better than bioplastics. Both options, however, generate problems of raw materials for their manufacture, such as the absence of sufficient crops (bioplastics) or the deforestation and collapse of recycling facilities (paper). At PICVISA, we work from our Test Center so that companies that develop new materials can test their recyclability in a full-scale plant where all the necessary conditions are recreated, acting as a testing laboratory, to perfect the result.

A clear example is the case of Vibrantz, which has developed a pigment applicable to black containers, a particular case due to the great difficulty in its recovery due to the unique characteristics of this color that make it undetectable for optical vision technologies.

The two options of new materials that are working are the use of monomaterial packaging and with a higher percentage of recycled content. This is intended to reduce the volume of laminated and multi-material composite packaging on the market, which is one of the biggest obstacles to achieving recyclability. In this sense, the Italian multinational Barilla has extended 100% recyclable packaging throughout Europe after a successful test in the United Kingdom, eliminating plastics and using exclusively cardboard from responsibly managed forests.

Other similar initiatives are, for example, the new 100% recyclable dishwasher capsules from Finish Powerball Quantum (Reckitt Benckiser) or the packaging for detergents from the Norwegian brand Maskinrens made from recycled fishing nets. There are also projects that advance in the creation of 100% recyclable monolayer bags, bioplastic films that degrade 20 times faster than conventional ones, transparent, lightweight and 100% recyclable PET containers, or dishwasher-safe and recyclable yogurt lids.

On the other hand, the United Nations Environment Programme intends, with a view to 2025, to eliminate unnecessary packaging, reuse packaging when appropriate and create 100% reusable, recyclable or compostable packaging. The signatories of this agreement represent 20% of all plastic packaging produced globally. These include, for example, Walmart, Nestlé or Coca-Cola. This company works, for example, so that 100% of its packaging is recyclable by 2025 and so that 50% of the material used to manufacture its packaging is recycled by 2030.

BLOCKCHAIN AND TRACEABILITY

The circularity of the food packaging sector is not limited, however, to the improvement of recycling processes, the reduction and, ultimately, the elimination of packaging as a way to minimize their environmental impact. The firm Bakkafrost (Faroe Islands), aquaculture, has developed its own packaging manufacturing line by adding a laser coding and printing system, with which it achieves comprehensive traceability that, while generating brand value, connects the manufacture and marketing of its products with the collection and recycling of these packaging.

Data management plays a fundamental role in this traceability of waste, a point that we believe is key at PICVISA and for which we developed our ECOFLOW flow analyzer, which, based on artificial intelligence, allows image collection, data processing and visualization. The use of sensors, artificial intelligence, blockchain and deep learning allows to analyze, quickly and accurately, the traceability of waste to be reused, recycled or recovered, favoring the transition process to a circular economy. Using Blockchain technology and adding PICVISA’s ECOFLOW analyzer, our DATA+ platform allows us to achieve the traceability of the processed waste, in addition to monitoring in real time the operation of the plant. A tool, in short, that can help the food packaging sector to move towards the increasingly necessary sustainability of food packaging and towards the evolution of the current industry to industry 5.0.