What Is rPET and Why Its Use Protects the Environment

Evergreen is a company that gets a supply of recycled plastics to then sort and process to create new products for companies. They primarily focus on food containers and bottles which are large factors in the waste stream.

Polyethylene terephthalate plastic (PET) is a type of plastic resin that is highly flexible, colorless and semi-crystalline. Depending on how the PET is to be used, it is either semi-rigid or rigid. PET plastic is prized by beverage and food companies because it can be used to make lightweight bottles and containers in a myriad of shapes, with excellent clarity and product protection. PET is pretty much the standard packaging material for the beverage industry (DISadmin, 2024).

PET is 100 percent recyclable and is the most recycled plastic in the United States and worldwide. According to the PET Resin Association, more than 1.5 billion pounds of used PET bottles and containers are recovered in the United States each year for recycling. Evergreen alone collects 11.6 billion post-consumer bottles each year (DISadmin, 2024).

rPET is recycled polyethylene terephthalate plastic. This recycled plastic resin is highly sought after by beverage and food companies as well as many others that make strapping, clothing, shoes, and carpeting to name a few. The reason? They want their packaging and products to contain recycled content to lessen the environmental impact and help close the loop on plastics (DISadmin, 2024).

Converting post-consumer PET bottles and containers into a valuable resource such as rPET helps the environment because rPET has a lower carbon footprint than virgin PET. It also reduces demand for virgin PET, which requires more energy and water to produce (DISadmin, 2024).

Companies like Evergreen operate recycling facilities that collect, sort, and clean post-consumer PET bottles for recycling into rPET pellets. Evergreen can produce up to 217 million pounds of high quality, food grade rPET pellets each year. At Evergreen, food grade rPET pellets are made to the specifications of the customer following rigorous manufacturing and quality control processes (DISadmin, 2024).

Evergreen currently has four locations across North America: California, Ohio, New York, and Nova Scotia. Ohio's facility has plastic recycling, AI robotic sorting, rPET manufacturing, a quality assurance lab, and an expansion project that was completed in 2022.

Currently just 27% of plastics are recycled. The rest goes to landfills or the environment – an alarming volume of plastic bottles and containers find their way into oceans, impacting marine life and the environment at large. By using rPET, companies close the loop on PET plastic: companies increase demand for post-consumer PET, which in turn supports more recycling and diverts plastic waste from oceans. Basically, using rPET benefits everyone and is a tremendous motivator for companies (DISadmin, 2024).

With only a small amount of the PET bottles actually being recycled is there an opportunity for designers to encourage recycling among individuals? Whether it is in the product's features, like a bottle's cap and body being the same type of plastic, or the recycling system within their community? Evergreen's efforts to cut down on plastics that make it to the landfill and that are then reused to limit the creation of new resources is an example of how more products materials can take on a circular approach.

Reference.

DISadmin. (2024, February 15). What is Rpet and why its use protects the environment. Evergreen. https://www.evergreentogether.com/2024/02/06/what-is-rpet-and-why-its-use-protects-the-environment/