According to Euromonitor's Global Packaging Trends Report, more than 480 billion plastic beverage bottles were sold worldwide in 2016, 30 billion years ago, and will increase to 583.3 billion by 2021. So much Plastic bottles are being produced and used. Where did the final flow go after completing the mission?
Since plastics take hundreds of years to degrade, the discarded plastic bottles are still in nature, and eventually become plastic garbage collected in the oceans, rivers and lakes. How to solve the pain points of beverage packaging recycling is still a must for the industry. The subject of facing.
Plastic hazard that cannot be ignored
The toxins produced by plastic waste will be bioaccumulated through the food chain, and humans will be affected by these toxins after eating these seafood products.
At the just-concluded World Cup in Russia, a Beijing company undertook the recycling of beverage bottles during the event. The company's 50 bottles of intelligent recycling machines were unveiled in 12 competition venues, which were sought after by fans and accumulated during the World Cup. More than 1 million plastic bottles are safely recycled.
In China, the recycling of plastic bottles is 'difficult'. In daily life, most people can drink the bottles into the trash after drinking the beverages - perhaps people think this is environmentally friendly. On the other hand, many plastic bottles were used in the recycling of waste products, and they entered the informal recycling channel. Since small-scale recycling plants do not have corresponding pollution control equipment, recycling plastics is easy to cause environmental pollution. Brings the risk of food safety.
According to the UNEP data, about 1 million plastic bottles are sold every minute in the world. The global plastic bags are used up to 5 trillion a year. Of the plastic products we use, 50% are disposable, nearly 1 The plastic packaging of /3 is not recycled, and 13 million tons of plastic waste flows into the ocean every year. At the same time, the toxins produced by plastic waste will be bioaccumulated through the food chain, and humans will be affected by these toxins after eating these seafood. 1. Among the marine plastic waste, the first place is the beverage bottle, and the third place is the bottle cap.
In recent years, some recycling companies have begun to enter stations, shopping malls, and communities. By setting up smart recycling machines, they are trying to get more beverage bottles back on the right track. After safe recycling, they will re-generate beverage bottles through professional processing factories to directly reduce the consumption of petroleum resources. Or, as a fiber. However, the reporter found that this intelligent, professional beverage bottle recycling method did not achieve the desired results.
'Deposit mode' or a good try
The safe recovery rate of beverage bottles during the pilot period was over 70%.
The China Business Daily reporter went to Cuiwei Department Store in Fuxing Road, Haidian District, Beijing. Here, the reporter found a beverage bottle intelligent recycling machine. Its size, appearance and ordinary vending machine are almost indistinguishable. The usage method was clearly marked. The reporter first registered the basic information with the mobile phone according to the schematic diagram, and then completed the recycling of a Coke bottle in just a few seconds. After the information left by the registration, the user also obtained the 'rebate'. The money can be used at any time. Cash withdrawals can also be made in other ways.
Such a smart plastic bottle recycling machine should be placed in a shopping mall where people come and go. There should be no shortage of 'business'. However, the reporter waited for nearly half an hour, but few people 'respected'.
Later, the reporter went to Donghuan Square in Dongzhong Street, Dongcheng District, Beijing. There is also a beverage bottle intelligent recycling machine. The situation here is slightly better than that in Haidian District. Two people took it in 15 minutes. The bottle is coming over. The operator of the two beverage bottle intelligent recycling machines is Beijing Yingchuang Renewable Resources Recycling Co., Ltd. The above mentioned World Cup competition venue is the Yingchuang beverage bottle intelligent recycling machine.
Liu Xueyu, executive deputy general manager of Beijing Yingchuang Recycling Resources Recycling Company, told reporters that Yingchuang has put nearly 5,000 beverage bottle intelligent recycling machines in Beijing, including shopping malls, schools, subway stations and bus stations in urban areas and some suburbs. At present, an average of about 2 million beverage bottles can be recycled every week for special treatment. However, combined with the huge amount of beverage bottles produced in Beijing and surrounding areas, the company's production capacity is still surplus, and it is in a state of 'not eating enough'.
'The current status quo is that the professional recycling enterprises have more than enough capacity, while the other side still has a large number of renewable plastic bottles flowing into the 'small workshops'. The industrial strong alkali solvent cleaning beverage bottles cause huge pollution to the soil and water sources. Industry insiders told the China Business Daily reporter.
And the solution to the problem of 'not enough to eat' - promote the deposit model or a good choice.
In 2016, Yingchuang and Beijing Wumei Supermarket established a smart and convenient safe recycling demonstration station, 'testing water' beverage bottle deposit system. 'The bottle we sold in the supermarket was labeled with a virtual deposit, after the consumer bought the drink and drank it. The 'deposit' can be obtained by putting the empty bottle into the automatic recycling machine of the recycling demonstration station. The recycling price of the beverage bottle printed with the virtual deposit system is 0.2 yuan, which is higher than the ordinary beverage bottle recycling price. More than 300,000 bottles of beverages with the deposit logo were recovered, and the safe recovery rate of beverage bottles was over 70%. ' Liu Xueyu said.
How the deposit model operates
The deposit system is jointly established by the retailer and the beverage industry, and is managed in a non-profit model.
The deposit process begins with the beverage distributor, and the beverage product is sold to the retail store. In addition to paying the beverage product price to the beverage manufacturer, the retail store also pays the full deposit of the beverage bottle.
The beverage manufacturer cannot retain the deposit, but instead transfers the deposit to the deposit system operator, which is a non-profit, independent third party usually consisting of the retail industry and related practitioners. Unified management of the system.
For example, if a consumer buys a beverage, the price of the beverage also includes a refundable deposit of 1 yuan. Of course, the consumer knows that he has paid the deposit for the beverage bottle because there is a clear deposit mark on the beverage package. As a responsible The environmentally-friendly citizen, the consumer should return the empty bottle to the store after drinking the beverage, or any other recycling store. The deposit of 1 yuan will be refunded to the consumer in full, and the system operator will arrange to collect the returned air from the retailer. Bottles are inventoried, sorted and compressed, and sold as recyclable materials to specialized recycling plants for processing.
At this time, the 1 yuan deposit originally paid by the retail store to the beverage manufacturer and transferred from the beverage manufacturer to the operating system supplier will be returned to the retailer after the operator has collected the empty bottle. In addition to the refunded 1 yuan deposit The system operator will also pay the retailer some fees as a reward for the retailer to provide consumers with convenient and convenient collection points. The collected empty bottles are collected and transported to the system operator's sorting center for inventory, and according to Different color and quality classification and compression packaging. After being packaged, it is sold to a professional recycling factory for recycling. After the bottle label and bottle cap are recycled and separated, the empty bottle will be crushed and cleaned, and the processing will be safe. Recycled materials with environmentally friendly standards. After mixing with the original materials, new preforms can be produced. The new preforms are heated into new beverage bottles in the beverage factory, and can be sold after the cans are filled. The process of recycling is completed.
So, who is responsible for the cost of this cycle?
'Maybe it's a little unexpected. In fact, this 'program' does not require government funding. The deposit system is jointly established by the retailer and the beverage industry. It manages operations in a non-profit mode and raises funds in three ways: The deposit of the returned empty bottle, the income from the sale of renewable materials, and the small management fee paid by the beverage manufacturer for the operation of the deposit system. ' Liu Xueyu told reporters that the goal of the deposit system is as low as possible. Operating under cost.
Then, the question is how the system operator can grasp the situation where the deposit has not been returned. Do you need to know the situation of the goods already sold to get the return of the empty bottle? The answer is very simple, just the barcode on the bottle label, the barcode is recorded. A lot of information about the product, such as the brand, the size and capacity of the bottle, as well as the value of the product and the deposit, etc.' Liu Xueyu said.
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More and more countries and regions have begun to implement the deposit system
At present, 50 countries and regions in the world have implemented deposit system, Germany, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Estonia, Netherlands, Lithuania, etc.... The average recovery rate is 85%, and the popular support rate is 79.68%.
Germany has implemented a deposit system since 2003. Many beverage bottle labels have a 0.25 Euro mark on the label, which means that when the consumer finishes the drink and returns to the mall or collection point with an empty bottle, he can return a deposit of 0.25 Euro. According to the data, the recovery rate of cans in Germany is 96%, and the recovery rate of beverage bottles is 98.5%. This achievement is directly related to the German law that disposable beverage packaging must implement the 'deposit system'.
In 2006, Australia's New South Wales, Australia began to implement the deposit system. The six-month return of the deposit system accounted for 70% of the total recovered material, and the annual recovery of single PET category exceeded 12,000 tons.
In March of this year, the UK officially announced that the deposit recovery system (including plastic packaging, glass bottles and metal disposable packaging) will be implemented in England.
Currently, Queensland, Australia is carrying out a tender for the deposit system, while Spain, Singapore and other countries are also about to promote the deposit system.