Q&A: Building a value chain around circular economy principles

Since launching, Sabic’s portfolio of certified circular polymers have proven to be an unqualified success. But certified circular technology is still in its infancy, according to Mark Vester, Global Leader, Circular Economy at Sabic. Scaling the technology requires ‘value chain collaborations and innovations on an unprecedented scale’, he said.

Over this past year, the materials in your TRUCIRCLE portfolio seem to have found application in a wide variety of packaging applications. Has the response from the market lived up to expectation?

Since launching in late 2019, our TRUCIRCLE portfolio has received unprecedented interest from companies in packaging and beyond who are looking for commercially and environmentally viable solutions which can help to address the plastic waste challenge.

The common unifier among these companies is the need to deliver the highest quality solutions that don’t compromise consumer safety and help address the environmental and sustainability goals demanded by society. Manufacturers need to be given access to more sustainable materials so that they and the end-consumer can feel confident in plastic products and that they can be recycled and repurposed.

What is significant about our TRUCIRCLE portfolio is the number of consumer products we have helped brand leaders launch in the last year. We’ve worked for example with Unilever (Magnum & Knorr), Estee Lauder Companies, Mars Incorporated and more to create food and personal care packaging using our certified circular polymers.

Much has been written about the materials produced through chemical recycling. Why did you choose to work with the technology developed by Plastic Energy?

Advanced (or chemical/feedstock) recycling holds the key to reducing the use of conventional approaches of handling end of life plastics, such as landfill and combustion. These approaches can lock plastics out of reach, destroy future value and, in the case of combustion and landfill, risk releasing elevated levels of CO2 into the atmosphere and polluting the environment. A truly circular economy has to be one where plastics waste is retained and reused.

We partnered with Plastic Energy as the company is leading the way in its field in transitioning to a low-carbon circular economy for plastics. It is one of the few companies worldwide that has sold millions of litres of recycled oils from the conversion of end-of-life plastic waste, using patented technology.

We are committed to collaborating with upstream and downstream partners to drive to establish a value chain for plastics which is built around circular economy principles. We continue to evaluate advancements in technologies, solutions and collaborations which can increase the volumes of circular feedstocks to market.

What exactly are ‘certified circular polymers’ under the ISCC scheme? How does that work?

SABIC’s certified circular products contribute towards a new value chain, where we work in coordination with our upstream suppliers and key downstream customers to upcycle used mixed plastic back to the original polymer.

Our certified circular polymers are produced through the feedstock recycling of low quality, used mixed plastic that could otherwise be destined for incineration or landfill. It takes difficult-to-recycle used plastic back to the molecular level through a process called pyrolysis. This technology breaks plastic down by heating it at a very high temperature in an oxygen-free environment, producing pyrolysis oil. The pyrolysis oil then needs to be refined and upgraded for use as feedstock. This process culminates in polymers that have identical properties to virgin-based polymers and allows plastics to be recycled over and over again, with no loss of properties or characteristics.

Our certified circular polymers are recognised through the International Sustainability and Carbon Certification plus (ISCC+) scheme that certifies content and standards across the value chain from source to end product. The ISCC+ certification works on what is known as a ‘mass balance system’, meaning that for each tonne of circular feedstock fed into the cracker and substituting fossil-based feedstock, a tonne of the output can be classified as circular.

To what extent does ‘renewably sourced’ play a role in Sabic’s view of sustainable packaging?

Certified renewable materials are one of our complementary solutions offered as part of our TRUCIRCLE portfolio Our renewable polymers are high-quality virgin polymers, based on second-generation bio-based feedstock – such as waste from wood pulping processing. Like Sabic’s circular polymers, its renewable polymers have been accredited and certified through the International Sustainability and Carbon Certification plus scheme (ISCC PLUS).

The products, including our renewable polycarbonate, do not interact or compete with the human food chain and can help to reduce both CO2 emissions as well as the use of fossil feedstock during production. The performance of the renewable materials is equal to those produced using fossil feedstock and without impacting production and processing methods and increase the recyclability of the product.

Our range of certified renewable products are made to the same high specifications as materials made using traditional feedstocks, making it a solution that can work seamlessly with current production processes.

What about mechanical recycling – what is the share of products derived through mechanical recycling in the TRUCIRCLE portfolio?

Mechanical recycling has an important role to play in our journey towards closing the loop on used plastic. As the most mature of the recycling technologies on the market today, it offers an ideal solution for the recycling of high purity mixed-used plastics. It is also a solution that is helping to create a crucial bridge between today’s linear economy and a more sustainable, circular economy for plastics. It is complementary to other circular recycling processes and solutions including advanced recycling, which can process more challenging, mixed-used plastic, such as films and plastics bags, where mechanical recycled is not an option.

Our approach to mechanically recycled products aims to include high amounts of recycled content in plastics, without compromising the quality or performance for packaging, automotive and electronics.

What is Sabic’s approach to designing for recyclability and how is the company supporting its customers in this area?

A challenge facing plastic recycling is the fact that often a product is made of many different plastic elements or layers which serve different functionalities, which makes it more difficult to separate and recycle. Up to 80% of a product’s environmental impacts are determined at the design phase, so manufacturers must work together with customers to design packaging solutions which can be recycled effectively.

On a product level, we strive to embed sustainability in packaging product design and development to make sure the products on the market can be fed back into the value chain. This process should include a consideration towards reducing the complexity of materials and polymers used to create a specific product.

At Sabic we focus on both packaging design as well as product development that allow for better re-use and recycling of our customer’s solutions. Packaging will be required to meet various new EU recycling requirements in 2025 – to what extent have the strategic choices made by Sabic been influenced by these?

Certified circular technology is still in its infancy and there are a number of steps required to make the technology truly scalable, so it becomes a more competitive option when compared to virgin polymers. We are determined to increase the volume of recycled products we process in Europe to 200 Kilotons by 2025, in line with our pledge to the EU Commission.

To do this, we are working with a range of partners to considerably increase our supply of certified circular polymers through the construction of our first commercial plant, situated in the Netherlands. The project relies on value chain collaborations and innovations on an unprecedented scale and will enable SABIC to significantly upscale the production of certified circular polymers.

Sabic is also working to advocate, and stimulate the right conditions, for creating a circular economy for plastics. It’s why we became a founding member of the Polyolefin Circular Economy Platform (PCEP), which was established in 2019 as an international forum through which stakeholders across the polyolefin value chain can collaborate to promote the circular economy.

In addition to recent technological advancements, we are working with retailers and partners on small scale projects which demonstrate that closing the loop is possible, taking used household packaging and turning it into new materials to be used again. Our recent pilot project working together with Tesco, Plastic Energy, Sealed Air and Bradbury’s Cheese demonstrated, for the first time, that flexible plastic can be continuously recycled and reused and that closing the loop on used flexible packaging is possible.

How are you responding, e.g. to the tethered cap regulation? And the SUP ban?

Effective packaging design is the first step to limiting the risk of plastics entering the environment and to addressing applicable regulatory compliance. Therefore, we are committed to working with customers to design packaging solutions which can facilitate recyclability and reuse.

Reuse can offer some advantages over recycling but it can also come with additional handling, logistics or require additional materials, so it isn’t always an appropriate option. We should look into evaluating which solution is most suited to the product. Making a comparison between these options is complex, but necessary, so we rely on the outcomes of full life cycle analysis to guide us.

Can you talk about the developments in sustainable packaging we may look forward to in the near future? Improvements in recycling and recyclability?

While there has been progress and improvements in recycling technology, one of the largest obstacles to adoption is the absence of an established global framework for waste collection. And whilst a closed loop for commercial packaging could be within reach in the not-too-distant future, municipal waste collection and recycling can vary greatly from state-to-state, let alone from country-to-country. This means, there is no single solution which will be effective globally and no consistent starting point in the journey towards circularity.

European countries, for example, will likely start from a well-developed infrastructure which have Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) schemes in place, as a way of holding manufacturers accountable for the end-of-life impacts of their plastic products and packaging. As a result, there will likely already exist streams of used plastics that can serve as circular feedstock.

However, in developing countries, more basic collection processes may need to be put in place in the absence of EPR schemes to help collect the used plastic ready for recycling. To create a circular economy for used plastics, seismic regulatory shifts are needed to stimulate market, system and technological developments, on both a local and global level.

In what way has the Corona crisis affected Sabic in terms of e.g. products, sales, outlook?

While COVID-19 is a unique situation which is constantly evolving, we expect that the impact of the pandemic to continue influencing our marketplace environment globally for the short to medium term. However, we have confidence in the resilience and strength of our operations and supply chain.

We have built our business on a foundation of bringing the benefits of sustainability to our organisation and those of our customers and partners and that will remain unchanged.

Meanwhile, we are maintaining our focus on being diversified geographically, and on producing products that are innovative, value-adding and address secular trends such as feeding growing populations, EVs, electronics and driving sustainability.

But we are also diversified in terms of applications to end customer, which is allowing us to better weather the storm. While some sectors have seen a downturn, like the automotive industry, others have had a considerable increase, like the healthcare industry and packaging. We are closely collaborating with our clients to understand market needs and adjust production accordingly.

The pandemic has also sparked a realization of just how vital plastics are for applications such as healthcare and hygiene. From lifesavers such as syringes, medical masks and PPE, to consumer items such as hand sanitizer, plastic has proved its worth across all facets of the global response to COVID-19. What is important is to demonstrate where plastic is the most appropriate material to be used and how it can be used responsibly.