Sealed Air invests $5M in Closed Loop Partners’ Circular Plastics Fund

Sealed Air Corp., a packaging manufacturer based in Charlotte, North Carolina, has invested $5 million in the Closed Loop Circular Plastics Fund to advance the recovery and recycling of plastics in the United States and Canada.

Dow, LyondellBasell and Nova Chemicals made an initial investment in the Closed Loop Circular Plastics Fund amounting to $25 million followed by a $10 million commitment from SK Global Chemical, New York-based Closed Loop Partners reports in a news release on this latest investment. Sealed Air Corp.’s investment brings the fund closer to its goal of deploying $100 million to advance scalable recycling technologies, equipment upgrades and infrastructure solutions.

According to Closed Loop Partners, the fund’s strategy fills investment gaps to spur recycling markets, attracting additional corporate investors and financial institutions and accelerating capital inflows beyond the fund’s own commitments. At scale, the fund’s investments aim to recycle more than 500 million pounds of plastics over the fund’s lifespan.

“[Sealed Air Corp.’s] investment in the Closed Loop Circular Plastics Fund demonstrates their commitment to be a part of the solution to plastic waste, marking a critical step in building a waste-free future for the plastics and packaging industry. Their scale and deep expertise in the space allow us to extend our reach even further and encourage other companies to invest more capital to scale critical sustainable solutions,” says Ron Gonen, founder and chief executive officer of Closed Loop Partners. “Current supplies of recycled plastics meet only 6 percent of demand for the most commonly used plastics in the U.S. and Canada. By investing in recycling infrastructure and innovation, we can ensure plastics are incorporated back into manufacturing supply chains after use, instead of going to landfills or the natural environment.”

This investment is part of Sealed Air Corp.’s SEE Ventures initiative that invests in disruptive technologies and new business models. The investment in this fund builds on the company’s current sustainability and plastics pledge to design or advance packaging solutions to be 100 percent recyclable or reusable by 2025.

“We are driving the packaging industry to a future that is more sustainable, where plastics are recovered and reused in a scalable way,” says Ted Doheny, president and chief executive officer of Sealed Air Corp. “Together we can make a bigger impact, and we are proud to join other companies to invest in this fund and help advance recycling efforts and improve the circular economy for packaging, especially flexible plastics.”

The Closed Loop Circular Plastics Fund, managed by Closed Loop Partners, will invest in three strategic areas to increase the amount of recycled polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP) available to meet the growing demand for high-quality, recycled content in products and packaging:

• access – increasing the collection of targeted PE and PP plastics by advancing current and next-generation material collection systems, including transportation, logistics and recycling sortation technologies and infrastructure;
• optimization – upgrading recycling systems to more efficiently aggregate, classify and sort the targeted plastics to increase the total amount of high-quality plastics, including food-grade and medical-grade plastics, sent for remanufacturing; and
• manufacturing – investing in facilities and equipment that manufacture finished products, packaging or related goods using recycled content, including recycled PE and PP.