Funding has been awarded to a new project to determine a standard for recycled plastic content.
With a new plastic packaging tax set to be introduced on plastic packaging containing less than 30% recycled content in 2022, Project RECORD will look to work out a method to assess the recycled plastic content.
This will ensure that companies are taxed appropriately in proportion to the amount of virgin plastic in their products.
A £750,000 grant has been awarded by the Small Business Research Initiative from the Government to Project RECORD to develop the industry standard, which will also involve working with the British Standards Institution.
Project RECORD is led by the Scottish Plastic Recycling Centre of Excellence (SPRCoE) working with Impact Solutions, Ecosurety, Winton Material Science, University of Strathclyde, Advanced Materials Research Laboratory, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh Napier University and Durham University.
SPRCoE and Impact Solutions have already demonstrated the feasibility of identifying a percentage of recycled content in polypropylene, polyethylene and polyethylene terephthalate using convention testing equipment.
Ecosurety discovery manager Gareth Morton said: “This critical project is pulling together industry-leading expertise to provide a much needed solution to a timely and significant problem – to provide an industry standard that can validate if plastic packaging contains at least 30% recycled content, ensuring the plastic packaging tax is implemented in a fair and accurate manner.
“Ecosurety is ideally placed to coordinate the sourcing of test materials from a wide variety of packaging producers for Project RECORD and we also look forward to engaging in the industry stakeholder workshops.”
