Plastics, Municipal

Pandemic affects the amount of plastics recovered for recycling

The COVID-19 pandemic combined with low virgin resin pricing and a vastly reduced overseas export market affected plastic recycling in North America in 2020, according to a report sponsored by the Association of Plastic Recyclers (APR), the Foundation for Plastic Recycling, The Recycling Partnership and the U.S. Plastics Pact.

The “2020 U.S. Post-consumer Plastic Recycling Data Report“ was compiled by Stina Inc., Sonoma, California, based on surveys conducted by the company and the National Association for PET Container Resources (NAPCOR), Charlotte, North Carolina. The report looks at the primary postconsumer plastic categories recovered for recycling, including bottles, nonbottle rigids and film.

According to the report, most major categories of plastic recovered for recycling saw a decrease in total pounds reported in 2020 compared with 2019. Nonbottle rigids saw the largest decrease, down 206.1 million pounds. Bottles decreased by 91 million pounds. However, film collection increased by approximately 8 million pounds compared with 2019.

Disruptions in collection and transportation, staffing shortages and supply chain issues affected the supply of material available for recycling, according to the report. Despite those challenges, the trend of more U.S.-sourced postconsumer plastics remaining within North America continues. Of the postconsumer plastics sourced in the U.S., only 8 percent were exported overseas.

In 2020, a total of 4,803.8 million pounds of postconsumer plastics sourced in the U.S. were recovered for recycling, a decrease of 5.7 percent compared with 2019. Bottles, nonbottle rigids and other plastics (excluding foam) saw declines in the amount of material recovered for recycling in 2020, with film collection up by just less than 1 percent. In aggregate, recycling of bottles, nonbottle rigid plastics, film and other plastics declined by 290 million pounds in 2020 compared with 2019, according to the report.

North American reclaimers acquired 97 percent of the 2,744 million pounds of bottles recovered for recycling in the U.S. in 2020, a 24.6 million-pound decrease from 2019. Polyethylene terephthalate (PET) and high-density polyethylene (HDPE) bottles made up 98.8 percent of this total recovery at 64.4 percent and 34.4 percent, respectively, the report notes. The combined bottle recycling rate was 27.2 percent, down from 28.7 percent in 2019, with the PET bottle recycling rate at 27.1 percent and HDPE at 28.8 percent.

Additional details from the report are available at http://bit.ly/2020- postconsumer-plastic-recycling-data.