Bioplastic materials’ value propositions well reflected in European Parliament’s report on Plastics Strategy

"Bioplastics offer two paradigmatic developments at opposite ends of products’ life cycles. On the one hand, bio-based plastics enable feedstock diversification and the gradual transition away from fossil and towards renewable feedstocks. This is an essential value proposition in the EU’s bid to gain independence from fossil resource imports and to significantly reduce CO2emissions.
The other key innovation proposed by the bioplastics industry is biodegradability and compostability according to existing harmonized standard on industrial composting (EN 13432), that is, the conversion of plastic materials to water, biomass, and CO2 through microbial metabolisation. Applied to food contact applications such as biowaste collection bags or food packaging, biodegradability and compostability enables the optimisation of separate bio-waste collection for organic recycling, thus preserving valuable secondary resources and establishing an important aspect of the circular economy. In other environments, biodegradability can help to reduce plastic waste accumulation, for example in modern agriculture through the use of mulch films that are biodegradable in soil according to the standard EN 17033. In addition to this, there could also be selected future applications in marine contexts where items such as fishing gear are prone to being lost at sea unintentionally."

Read more