Does the German Packaging Legislation (and that of some other European countries) in its current form mean that the paper industry is losing valuable fibres?

The regulation, according to which packaging with more than five per cent of non-paper components is to be classified as composite, means that easily recyclable paper packaging with a plastic content of eight per cent, for example, has to be disposed of in the Yellow Bin, designed for the collection of licensed packaging, from where it ends up in incineration as non-recyclable.

At the same time, this regulation allows packaging with barrier coatings that prevent the paper from dissolving during recycling to be disposed of in the paper bin – because the barrier makes up less than five per cent of the packaging!

As part of the reorganisation of packaging recycling, recyclability must therefore be the sole criterion for the correct disposal of paper packaging, irrespective of arbitrary mass percentages!

We expect an exciting discussion on this at the INGEDE Symposium on 25/26 February! Among others with Ulrich Leberle from CEPI in Brussels, who will report on the status of the PPWR; Johannes Zipfel (DELSCI) with the balancing act of developing well recyclable barriers; Alexey Vishtal (MM Group) with the same problem from the perspective of a manufacturer and recycler of barrier material; Karsten Hunger (IPV) exposes simple truths as fairy tales; Stefan Wessel (LANDBELL AG) and Olaf Postel (PreZero Service) with a look at lost and recovered fibres from dual and take-back systems, and other expert speakers.

Ralph Dittmann (WKS Group) will kick things off with the call: Print! For the sake of the environment! Print products that are easy to recycle are environmentally friendly – Axel Fischer (INGEDE) will report on current developments in printing processes and deinkability. Numerous other presentations will cover a wide range of topics relating to Paper for Recycling, from PFAS to probiotics, from cavitation to test methods.
www.ingede.org

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