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Major plastic initiative sets sights on system change

Published: June 18, 2025
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Holding a PET bottle for recycling

The Alliance to End Plastic Waste announced a shift in focus from small projects to wide-scale efforts to improve recycling on a national scale. | spwidoff/Shutterstock

Five years after its billion-dollar founding, the Alliance to End Plastic Waste is taking what it learned from one-off projects and shifting its attention to country-scale change.  Continue Reading

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Coke bottler’s switch to clear PET provides lessons learned

Published: June 18, 2025
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Sprite bottles in store.

A case study from the Northeast Recycling Council details a regional bottler’s journey from green PET to clear. | Adnan Zain Kautsar/Shutterstock

A recent case study from the Northeast Recycling Council offers insights on transitioning packaging materials, gleaned from a regional Coca-Cola bottler that switched from green PET to clear for several of its products. Continue Reading

How MRFs develop their accepted material lists

Published: June 11, 2025
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Material acceptance at MRFs varies widely by locality, but several stakeholders explained the factors behind such wide-reaching decisions. | StoyanYotov/Shutterstock

Several MRF operators recently provided insight into how their facilities decide what materials to accept, during a discussion on bridging the disconnect between brand owners and MRFs. Continue Reading

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UN member countries bring focus to plastic treaty

Published: June 11, 2025
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Plastics waste on a beach seen from above.

The majority of UN member countries used the United Nations Ocean Conference in Nice, France, to bring awareness to the approaching treaty negotiations. | Mario De Moya F/Shutterstock

More than 90 countries called for a renewed focus on a global plastics treaty during a recent United Nations Ocean Conference, as the clock runs down toward the next round of treaty negotiations.  Continue Reading

Beverage and bag producers fined for recycled resin failures

Published: June 11, 2025
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used beverage containers

Two dozen plastics producers were penalized for failing to use the minimum recycled content required in Washington state. | Emilija Miljkovic/Shutterstock

Plastics producers who failed to meet Washington state’s minimum post-consumer resin threshold were recently hit with fines ranging from a couple hundred dollars up to $55,000. Continue Reading

Texas plant in limbo after Eastman loses DOE grant

Published: May 30, 2025
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The $375 million grant represented about one-third of the required funding for the company’s second U.S. chemical recycling plant. The operational Kingsport, Tennessee facility is pictured. | Photo Courtesy of Eastman

Tennessee-based Eastman has lost its $375 million federal grant, which previously had spurred the company to make a final investment decision on its second U.S. methanolysis plant, located in Texas. 

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Groups add nuance to policy position on chemical recycling

Published: June 4, 2025
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Industry groups are working to define their position on the complex technologies included in the broad and ill-defined sector of chemical recycling. | Extarz/Shutterstock

In recent weeks, two U.S. recycling organizations have released policy positions on chemical recycling. But questions remain for the often controversial recycling methods included in the umbrella term of chemical recycling, also known as molecular or advanced recycling.  Continue Reading

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Alpek closing North Carolina PET plant

Published: June 4, 2025
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The Fayetteville site is the company’s second U.S. PET plant to close in less than two years. | Aykut Erdogdu/Shutterstock

Major PET producer Alpek is closing a North Carolina plant that includes both virgin and RPET production, with operations to cease by July 31.

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Financing, uncertainty feed EU recycler bankruptcies

Published: May 29, 2025
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Despite sweeping legislative mandates that would seem to result in stronger demand for recycled content, Europe has seen its own share of hurdles to PCR adoptions. | Ugis Riba/Shutterstock

While delays and court setbacks have provided a temporary and tenuous reprieve from President Donald Trump’s market-disrupting tariffs, the European recycling sector continues to struggle with a rash of bankruptcies, most filed months before the trade war even began.
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