Lydia Linna: Valorlux recently increased the types of plastic items that are accepted in the blue bags, such as yogurt and butter containers or plastic films around water bottles. However, there are still some items that are not accepted (such as those made of black plastic) because the optical sorting technology does not recognise them. Are there plans to develop or adopt a way to address this?
Claude Turping: The problem is actually bigger than that. Multi-layer plastic items, or items that are made with metal and plastics, cannot be recognised or recycled either.
Two years ago, we conducted some trials with a company who is a leader in optical sorting technology--the items were brought to Koblenz and analysed further. There were some multi-plastics and other types of items that could be sorted with special equipment. However, the costs of transportation must also be considered, and the quantities were not that significant. So at this point, we are not going to invest in new technology for sorting black plastics. We’ve decided that it will not bring any noticeable results.
In addition, we estimate that approximately 90% of the products that Luxembourg consumes on a daily basis are imported from Belgium or the Netherlands, and we have little impact on their choices of packaging material.
But there’s a solution for this issue on the horizon, with a new packaging directive on the way that should be officialised in the autumn. Starting from 2028, every material placed on the market has to be recognisable by optical scanner.
Valorlux blue bags are available and used for recycling in private homes, the train station and in shopping centres, for example. Are there plans for their use in public places where there is already a (general) garbage can installed, such as next to bus stops?
In fact, there is already a pilot up and running in Kehlen. We did some research on what is in the public bins, and we identified quite a lot of packaging waste as well. And now we have installed a separate collection system in 32 places in Kehlen. This pilot has been running for three or four months now, and we will draw conclusions 12 months after the start of the trial.
We’re all aware of the new recycling targets, which are quite ambitious. And we think that in order to achieve them here in Luxembourg, it might be necessary to also include public areas in the scope.
The EU directive on packaging sets the following targets: 50% of plastic packaging should be recycled by 2025, 55% by 2030. According to Eurostat, Luxembourg recycled 34.7% of its plastic packaging in 2020. Does Valorlux have plans to continue to expand what is currently accepted in order to meet these targets?
The 34.7% from Eurostat refers to packaging in general--household and industrial packaging waste combined. Valorlux is only responsible for what we call household packaging.
So what’s the difference? Household packaging is the packaging that comes out of your daily consumption at home: this can include a bottle of milk, a bottle of shampoo or a plastic bag, for example. And in 2021, we achieved a recycling rate of 58.85% via the Valorlux scheme.
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Industrial packaging, on the other hand, can be distinguished by its application or its size. For instance, if you buy mustard in a 20-kilo container, this is probably destined for commercial or industrial usage. There is not a yet a recycling scheme--such as the one Valorlux offers--for industrial packaging. It is still in progress.
Next year, Luxembourg will have new laws to measure recycled packaging in a way that will be closer to reality. We will measure in a different way: for example, a 30-gramme plastic bottle with three grammes of moisture remaining should be counted as 30 grammes, instead of 33 grammes, which already results in a 10% difference.
Did Valorlux notice any trends in the recycling of packaging during the covid pandemic?
Specifically related to plastics, what we now see is a shift from plastic packaging to paper packaging. However, that also comes with some major issues. In order for cardboard to be used in contact with liquid or moisture--such as a salad, soup or coffee--every piece of cardboard packaging has a small plastic film.
This makes recycling this kind of packaging quite complicated and is something that a lot of people don’t notice. You have to take a close look, but there’s a small layer of plastic on the inside and sometimes even on the outside as well to make it water resistant--and this makes recyclability impossible.
We’re seeing this a lot now. On-the-go consumption has shifted from plastic to cardboard in the past two to three years, but this switch from plastic to plastified cardboard is not the way to go. And this, in my opinion, is a much bigger issue today than black plastic--the quantities are high, and people might not know that the cardboard has these inner and outer layers of plastic that makes it impossible to recycle.