EU Commission fast-tracks support for plastics recyclers

Several short-term measures put forth by the European Commission aim to support EU plastics recyclers, while also stressing the urgency of addressing inexpensive imported resin and other headwinds — which threaten North American markets too.

As set out in a Dec. 23 communication, the measures include implementing EU-wide “end-of-waste” criteria for mechanically recycled plastics, to create a single regional market by consistently determining when discarded plastic is no longer considered to be waste. This move would enable the use of recycled plastics in manufacturing, as well as reduce the administrative burden on recyclers and stabilize the supply of high-quality recyclate, the group said.

The short-term measures will help provide a blueprint for the Circular Economy Act proposal expected later this year, the communication said, and help accelerate progress in the flailing recycling market. The Commission notes that Europe’s installed plastic recycling capacity had grown to 13.2 million metric tons by 2023, with growth rates as high as 17% in 2021, but slowed to 6% in 2023.

And by the end of 2025, amid numerous bankruptcies, the industry would see a net decrease of 1 million metric tons of annual capacity, the Commission said – an amount equivalent to France’s entire recycling capacity. This echoes warnings of industry collapse in Europe as well as in North America.

In addition, the Commission is proposing the first mass balance allocation rules to provide greater regulatory certainty for chemical recycling investments. The EU plastics industry plans up to €8 billion ($9.35 billion) in chemical recycling investments in coming years but “has called for a conducive regulatory framework to ensure they succeed,” the Commission said.

To this end, the document proposes harmonized rules for calculating, verifying and reporting chemically recycled plastics, to enable chemical recyclate to count toward recycled content targets and to recognize the role of chemical recycling as a complement to mechanical methods.

In a statement, industry organization Plastics Europe praised the Commission’s moves to protect the industry from unfair competition. However, to deliver circularity at scale, the group said “other measures will need to follow” this “first batch of measures and initiatives.”

Plastics Europe also welcomed the move to establish harmonized guidelines, while also advising against limiting the criteria to mechanically recycled resin and encouraging a “technology-neutral” approach by extending the criteria to all recycling methods as well as their output.

The Commission also will relaunch the Circular Plastics Alliance, with the proposal of a joint workplan for 2026 with “urgent deliverables” to include an initial “high-level dialogue on competitive circularity of plastics,” to take place in first-quarter 2026.

This industry-led analysis aims to help identify the key challenges to address and to provide a basis for the Commission to prioritizing actions such as conducting market surveillance, encouraging demand and creating a dedicated customs code for recycled polymers.

The new Import Surveillance Task Force can monitor plastic imports and complement a dedicated system introduced in March 2025 to track movements of some industrial chemicals. To help inform potential trade investigations, the Commission asks that EU stakeholders review the results of the two measures and provide market intelligence and data on their economic realities. According to the statement, “The Commission stands ready to initiate trade defence investigations on the basis of well substantiated requests where harmful import surges are identified.”

So far the Commission has imposed six trade measures on plastics-related products, including anti-dumping measures against Chinese PET, as well as anti-subsidy duties on Indian PET and RPET. The document noted that additional investigations are under way for a broad range of products.

In addition to being uncompetitively priced compared to EU-origin recyclate, virgin resin imports may be mislabeled as recycled material amid global overcapacity and low demand. Both the US and Canada have also noted this issue, with industry association NAPCOR finding that US and Canadian RPET imports reached record levels in 2024, and Association of Plastic Recyclers is working to quantify the issue and recommend US policy-based solutions.

Growing recognition of need for harmonized standards

Despite rapidly shifting trade flows, geopolitical considerations and varying local regulations surrounding plastics, most global regions have a common goal of reducing plastic waste and pollution. And the EU is driving demand for recycled plastics, according to recent analysis from commodity intelligence firm ICIS.

In early 2025, Antonello Ciotti, chairman of industry association PETCORE Europe, noted that an effective recycling industry requires cooperation at both the local and global levels.

“The effort is so big that you really need to have a combined effort,” he said during the adaPETation podcast last February. He added that there should be globally agreed-upon guidance for design for recyclability to give “a clear understanding of what we mean by recycling” as well as financial support to stand up robust local collection.

The Association of Plastic Recyclers in the US and Europe’s RecyClass are collaborating to harmonize packaging design standards, and reported on progress last April, at the two-year mark of a three-year agreement to drive global harmonization on designing plastic packaging to be recycled.

For example, APR and RecyClass each categorize design features to inform assessments of packaging recyclability. The latest progress report notes that although the category definitions “are quite similar, subtle differences exist, which translate to differences within APR and RecyClass’s respective guidance” adding that the collaboration’s scope includes clarifying and narrowing “these minor differences.”