Plastic packaging - How do we get to where we want to be?

Abstract

Plastic waste has been recognised as a threat to the UK’s environmental quality, with a range of potential impacts on ecosystems, the economy and human-wellbeing. The UK government via its 25 Year Environment Plan and the recent Resources and Waste Strategy has committed itself to eliminating avoidable plastic waste by 2050. The Government has set ambitious targets for minimising the amount of plastic packaging and improving the plastic packaging recycling rate, while increasing the recycled content of plastic packaging. Government proposals aimed at reaching these targets include the introduction of a tax on plastic packaging with less than 30% recycled plastic, a deposit return scheme for plastic drinks containers, the development of an Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) system for packaging, and the acceleration of plans to improve consistency in the type of recyclable materials collected from all households and businesses in order to engage citizens in the processes of meeting environmental policy goals. This report produced by an interdisciplinary team at Brunel University London and the University of Leeds in collaboration with Defra, analyses the plastic packaging system in England and identifies new metrics that can be used for monitoring and assessing progress in meeting the targets set by the Government. It does so by employing a new multidimensional systems based approach termed ‘Complex Value Optimisation for Resource Recovery’ (CVORR) that supports understanding of how the various policy interventions, current and planned, need to be coordinated to deliver the desired outcomes.