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Background

Humanity is overshooting Earth´s ecological limits, consuming resources and generating waste at an unsustainable rate. Packaging materials are a valuable resources, yet at least 43 million tons of plastic, glass, metal, and paper packaging—much of it with market value—is landfilled or burned in the U.S. each year. Packaging waste is also the biggest component of ocean litter that harms marine life and pollutes our oceans. The commodity market value of this wasted glass, plastic, paper, and metal packaging is estimated at between $15 billion and $23 billion.i Companies have the resources to redesign products and packaging to stay within the bounds of our resource limitations but need to take stronger actions to recover and re-use waste.

Product packaging is a good place to start reducing and recycling waste; it represents nearly a third of the total U.S. municipal waste stream and is a substantial contributor to greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.ii Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) challenges companies to take responsibility for the impact of products and packaging over their full life cycle. Europe and Canada have adopted EPR practices to shift responsibility for packaging waste from consumers and governments to producers. EPR is a fast-growing area of focus for sustainability-minded companies in the U.S. Leading brands like Coca-Cola Co., Nestle Waters North America, and PepsiCo have taken responsibility for a majority of their post-consumer bottles and cans, setting an example for other consumer product companies.

Packaging and Carbon Pollution

Most attention on GHG reduction centers on large industrial sources such as electric utilities. Electric power is the largest source of GHG emissions when measured using a traditional industrial sector approach (34%). However, a recent systems-based analysis of embedded emissions in the U.S. supply chain concluded that products and packaging are responsible for an even bigger slice of GHG emissions (44%).iii

Nestle Waters NA found that 55% of its carbon footprint comes from its bottles.iv Coca-Cola Co. says packaging is the largest contributor to the carbon footprint of several of its products.v

In 2004, a European Union packaging directive required most members to achieve a 55% recycling goal for packaging by 2008. Strong U.S. packaging recycling rules could result in reduced electric power needed for production, thereby reducing GHG emissions. One recent study concluded that increasing recycling and composting, and reducing waste generation by 1% per year between 2008 and 2030 could yield a carbon dioxide reduction equivalent to closing 21% of U.S. coal-fired power plants.vi

Momentum for Change

As You Sow has obtained unprecedented commitments from Coca-Cola Co., Nestle Waters NA, and PepsiCo, three of the largest U.S. beverage companies, to recycle a majority of bottles and cans sold over the next six to eight years. These companies realize that significant improvements in systems for collecting and recycling empty containers are needed to achieve these goals. Through our EPR program, we are expanding engagement to consumer packaged goods companies. Several promising actions are underway pressing companies to take responsibility for post-consumer packaging through new EPR mandates:

Engaging Consumer Product Industry Leaders

As You Sow is engaging key consumer product companies like General Mills, Kraft Foods, Procter & Gamble, and Unilever to take responsibility for collection and recycling of their packaging. We are working with Coca-Cola Co. and Nestle Waters NA, as well as NGO stakeholders for broader corporate acceptance of EPR systems in the U.S. Since producers control design and marketing decisions, they have the greatest ability and incentive to reduce the overall environmental impact of their products. We are committed to extensive engagement with these consumer giants to adopt EPR policies for packaging waste and to develop more efficient product design and recovery systems that will lead to a long-term goal of sustainable production and consumption.

Making Consumption More Sustainable

EPR forces end-of-life management costs to be internalized while allowing continued economic growth. As Figure 2 shows, under the European Union directive gross domestic product continued to rise over the last decade while packaging use leveled off and packaging sent to landfills plummeted.

Increased recycling of packaging will yield strong environmental benefits, leading to more efficient use of materials, reduced extraction of natural resources, and lower GHG emissions. EPR policies will create new markets for packaging materials that currently have little value and keep plastics out of oceans where they imperil marine life.

Our Vision

EPR mandates can lead to new systems of production that use materials more efficiently and eliminate waste by turning discarded products into new raw materials. As You Sow welcomes your support as we engage companies to adopt stronger packaging stewardship policies that can lead to sustainable production and consumption of goods for future generations.

Footnotes
i As You Sow, March 2011.
ii USEPA, Municipal Solid Waste Generation, Recycling, and Disposal in the United States: Facts and Figures for 2009; http://www.epa.gov/osw/nonhaz/municipal/pubs/msw2009rpt.pdf.
iii Office of Solid Waste and Emergency Response, USEPA, Opportunities to Reduce Greenhouse Gas Emissions through Materials and Land Management Practices September2009; http://www.epa.gov/oswer/docs/ghg_land_and_materials_management.pdf. Also Joshuah Stolaroff, Products, Packaging and US Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Product Policy Institute, September2009; available here.
iv Nestlé Waters North America 2008 Citizenship Report, p. 31; http://www.nestle-watersna.com/pdf/reducing-mfg-logistics-footprint.pdf.
v Coca-Cola press release, March 9, 2009; available here.
iv Ecocycle, GAIA, ILSR, Stop Trashing the Climate, 2008; http://www.stoptrashingtheclimate.org/fullreport_stoptrashingtheclimate.pdf.