Pepsi “confusing” public over recycling of packaging

Waste awareness specialists told letsrecycle.com this week that consumers are already “confused” concerning the range of environmental symbols found on food and other packaging materials.

Common symbols on packaging: 1. Made from recycled material; 2. 100% recyclable aluminium; 3. Dispose of responsibly; 4. Recyclable; 5. “Green Dot” – recycling paid for by producer in some EU countries (not UK); 6. Recyclable steel; 7. One of seven types of recyclable plastic; 8. Please place in a recycling bank; 9. “Recycle Now” campaign symbol

But last week – as it emerged that PepsiCo is not contributing towards packaging producer responsibility in the UK – the company stated that all its packaging can be recycled, even crisp packets (see letsrecycle.com story).

The company said: “All of our packaging is fully recyclable and we make consumers aware of this by printing the recycling logo on the back of all of our packs.”

Rebecca Whalley, waste awareness officer at Pembrokeshire county council, contacted letsrecycle.com to point out that the symbols on PepsiCo’s Walkers brand crisp packets did not mean those packets could be recycled in this country.

She said: “The symbol on Walkers crisps is a Green Dot and basically only shows that a fee has been paid for the recovery of the packaging in some European countries.”

As participation in recycling increases thanks to the national “Recycle Now” campaign, councils and materials recycling organisations believe the next big issue will be contamination. Much effort is already undertaken to attempt to get through to householders what they can and cannot place in their recycling bins and boxes.

“The symbols are misleading to the public and as a result they end up placing items such as crisp packets in their local recycling scheme. ”
 – Rebecca Whalley, Pembrokeshire CC

“Contamination”
Ms Whalley said she had become “increasingly frustrated” by the use of recycling symbols on packaging and that they were “often misinterpreted by the public”.

She said: “The symbols are misleading to the public and as a result they end up placing items such as crisp packets in their local recycling scheme genuinely thinking they are doing the right thing as they have seen the symbol, however, this material should be placed in the black bag (wheeled bin) and is therefore viewed as contaminated material.”

Joy Blizzard, communications officer at the national organisation LARAC, the Local Authority Recycling Advisory Committee, said a range of different recycling and environmental symbols on packaging was confusing the public.

Ms Blizzard, who is also waste initiatives officer for Shropshire county council, said: “The phrase ‘n be recycled where facilities exist’ and the Mobius loops can be extremely confusing. The phrase in particular doesn’t help anybody. In Shropshire we get problems with contamination because we can’t recycle all types of plastic and film.”

However, Ms Blizzard conceded that there was no easy answer on how the system could be simplified.

She said: “A new UK-wide system wouldn’t help because each local authority recycling schemes are completely different and depend on different markets for materials.”

Apology

letsrecycle.com received an apology yesterday for the information issued last week by PepsiCo concerning its use of the “green dot” recycling symbol.

“Unfortunately, because of the light weight of the flexible packaging used for our products, it is uneconomic at the moment to attempt to recycle.”
 – Walkers website

However, a spokesperson insisted that the company’s packaging was all recyclable, stating that production waste including incorrectly printed crisp packets was being recycled by Teesside-based company Waste Exchange Services.

“One crisp packet does have trace amounts of aluminium in the plastic, but when you extrude the foil it re-plasticises the plastic and that evaporates the aluminium,” the spokesperson said.

But in terms of the recycling of used crisp packets, the spokesperson suggested it could be more harmful to recycle packets than to send them to landfill because of the washing required.

The PepsiCo spokesperson said: “We are of course concerned about pack recycling and all PepsiCo product packaging is fully recyclable. As a business however we face two issues with the practicalities of recycling. Firstly the actual recovery of used packs and we are currently conducting trials to find ways around this.

“The second issue is the cleaning of packs before they can be recycled. This has an environmental cost (water and energy) and we are currently investigating whether this cost outweighs the benefits of recycling,” the spokesperson added.

Incineration
The comments made yesterday by PepsiCo would appear to directly contradict the company’s own official Walkers website, which stated: “Unfortunately, because of the light weight of the flexible packaging used for our products, it is uneconomic at the moment to attempt to recycle.

“The process would use up more energy environmentally than saved to collect, clean and recycle the plastic. The best ‘recovery’ is via incineration and use of the energy produced,” the Walkers website states.

The PepsiCo spokesperson told letsrecycle.com: “The website may be out of date. All our packaging is recyclable.”