Postconsumer Plastic Bottle Recycling: Association of Plastic Recyclers/American Chemistry Counsel Issue 2018 Report

The Association of Plastic Recyclers and American Chemistry Council (collectively “ACC”) issued a report titled:

2018 United States National Postconsumer Plastic Bottle Recycling Report (“Report”)

The document constitutes the 29th annual National Postconsumer Plastic Bottle Recycling Report.

The goal of the Report is stated to be the quantification of the amount of high density polyethylene (“HDPE”) and polypropylene (“PP”) bottles collected for recycling (including the rate of recycling of such bottles). It is stated to include postconsumer recycling values and comments for polyethylene terephthalate (“PET”) developed by the National Association for PET Container Resources. Further, the reclaimer survey portion of the Report (other than for PET) is stated to have been conducted by More Recycling.

Characterized as “Highlights/Summary for 2018” include:

• Total collection rate was 28.9% with 52 million more pounds of postconsumer bottles collected in 2018 than in 2017. PET and HDPE bottles comprise 97.1% of the United States plastic bottle market.
• Over 90% of all collected postconsumer plastic bottles were processed in the United States in 2018. This is stated to be a significant change from past years. As to PET, only 7.7% of material collected in the US was processed outside of the country. This is stated to be a continuation of a 10-year trend in postconsumer PET export decline.
• The processing of recycled PET bottle material is stated to have risen by 238 million pounds in 2018 over 2017.
• The total recycled PET used in domestic end markets was stated to be up slightly. The cause was deemed to be increased usage in food/beverage and non-food bottle markets. Other major end markets, such as fiber, sheet and strapping, were down slightly over 2017.
• As to reclaimer plant capacity utilization (measured by total number of pounds processed as a percentage of total recycling plant capacity) the rate was stated to be up for PET reclaimers at 80%. This reflected both an increase in total plant capacity in the United States as well as an increase in PET material processed.

A copy of the Report can be downloaded here.