"Bioplastics hebben potentie echt duurzaam te zijn"

Persbericht European Bioplastics: "Bioplastics have a potential for being truly sustainable"

"Bioplastics made from bio-feedstock, and reintegrated into the biosphere as a nutrient, or recycled together with conventional plastic, clearly have a potential for being a truly sustainable material. And it could reduce fossil fuel consumption", stated EU Environment Commissioner Janez Potocnik in his opening speech to the 8th European Bioplastics Conference on the 10 and 11 December in Berlin, Germany. In his video message he pointed to the crucial role, bioplastics can play in Europe‘s transition towards a circular biobased economy.

Potocnik encouraged the bioplastics industry „to continue their work on making bioplastics a
truly sustainable material, neutral in its impact on food production and biodiversity“. However,
he also pointed out that the industry needs to continuously and transparently inform the public
about their products and processes in order to clarify its position and prosper in the future.
These recommendations were picked up directly by a group of experts in a panel discussion
on sustainability criteria investigating the most relevant question: „How to assess the
sustainability of bioplastics in a fair way?“. The panel started with a presentation by Professor
Matthias Finkbeiner from the Technical University Berlin on „Perspectives of Life Cycle
Assessment of Bioplastics“. „LCA is still the best available tool to assess the environmental
performance of bioplastics as fact-based as possible“, Finkbeiner stated and commented on
the Product Environmental Footprint (PEF) approach introduced by the European Commission
as „LCA overkill introducing pseudo solutions in order to achieve comparability“. The
panel discussion then focussed on the need to break down the complexity of assessing the
sustainability of bioplastics, the need to use available and valid methodologies and to provide
easy to use tools to consumers to understand these assessments and how they impact on
the product they are using.

Another highlight of the 8th European Bioplastics Conference was the annual market data
update by European Bioplastics and the Institute for Bioplastics and Biocomposites (IfBB -
University of Applied Arts Hannover, Germany). The data once more emphasised the success
of bioplastics industry with production capacities multiplying from around 1.4 million tonnes
in 2012 to more than 6 million tonnes in 2017. All material types are gaining ground with
biobased, non-biodegradable ‘drop-in’ solutions, such as biobased PE and biobased PET,
leading the field. Biodegradable plastics, including e.g. PLA, biodegradable polyesters and
starch-blends, are also demonstrating impressive growth rates. Their production capacity will
gain around 60 percent by 2017.

Download hier het volledige persbericht.