Cicloplast complete the circuit of plastic waste in Spain

Cicloplast, the company that will be created to deal with the recycling of waste from plastic containers in Spain, will also represent the trading companies of plastic containers, according to the agreement in principle reached between the manufacturers of raw materialsTransformers, retailers and recyclers of packaging plastic to be part of a same joint scheme.

The acceptance of the organization that represents marketers of plastic containers, AECOP, occurred earlier this year and was a considerable step forward because it gave greater meaning to the regulatory scheme to include all the representatives. At the end of last year, the manufacturers of raw materials, with SPPD; Transformers, FETEP and Fetraplast; and the recyclers, by Anarpla, had already decided be integrated into the structure of Cicloplast.

When at last AECOP agreed to enter into Cicloplast, seemed as she walked in an accelerated phase of the process. In parallel, SPPD had almost completed the statutes of establishment of the SocSpanish raw plastic iedad (SEMAP), the Corporation that the represent at Cicloplast. These statutes, in turn, should serve almost entirely for the creation of Cicloplast as joint-stock company and the rest of societies that integrate.

Figure 1 The achievement of the objectives of the Act of packaging will make that a large number of plants for recycling and recovery of plastics should be constructed.

Slowdown in negotiations

However, progress in the realization of the statutes of SEMAP which should take place in February did not place and the outcome of the elections and the difficulties to form Government ended up cool tempers hopeful that before even of the adoption of the law on packaging would be finalized the process of creation of Cicloplast and the companies taking part, along with the rest of societies which are given in Eco-Embalajes.

Sources consulted by this magazine recognize that there has been no substantial progress on the creation of Cicloplast in recent weeks, but not that this is of special concern. The process, there are so many parties involved, it is laborious and complete it takes time, is the general feeling of the people directly involved in the operation.

Comprehensive and unitary scheme

Eco-Embalajes is the Corporation that will manage the recovery and recycling of all Spanish waste, according to the scheme approved by the Spanish industry and in accordance with the guidelines of the containers and the future regulation in Spain directive.

Cicloplast will be a limited company formed by all the companies involved in the process of production, processing, marketing and recycling of packaging in our country. It is expected that the vast majority of the companies shall accede to Cicloplast the alternative provided for in Spanish law, the compulsory system of slogan, is much more expensive for companies that are not part ofCicloplast.

Cicloplast is a company to lose money, as the President of the Spanish Confederation of entrepreneurs of plastics (ANAIP) in the Assembly which took place last November. System in Europe works better, the French, have losses, so it is expected, according to the President of ANAIP, who, in the Spanish case, even though the experiences that will improve, will be moved also them is.

The approach of the current drafts of the Royal Decree Law of packaging is to have an integrated system of management of resources that is authorized by the competent authority and assumes an agreement between different operators and municipal councils. The Government resulting in the end chosen must pass the law and quickly transpose the EU packaging and its waste directive, as the deadline is June 30.

In five years, 25% recycled

Until now, successive drafts of the packaging Act set goals of recycling of the directive, i.e. 25% of packaging waste with a minimum of 15% in five years is recycled material. Also planned that, in two years, the quantities are 15 and 10 per cent, although this last criterion it is not clear that you enter in the final version.

In the luggage system, any user of a packaging prodcuto, once consumed, may return the packaging to its origin. And they are the Packers through the trade and distribution, those who have to take care of packaging waste to be returned to them. Manufacturers of packaging materials must, in turn, take waste for recycling. As says José Maria Cavanillas, director of ANAIP, no one wants the system of slogan.

Integrated management

In the integrated management system, responsible for the operation authorized, through the appropriate payment, the use of a password (Green point) of the packaging. The retrieved amount is intended to assist local councils in the extracoste which suppose them to separate different materials because, as indicates Cavanillas, the usual cost of collection and treatment is within current legal obligations. These municipalities separate materials and deliver it to the respective sectors for recycling. This is what is known as the French system.

In Spain, after adoption of the Decree Law of packaging, will be created Eco-Embalajes, a corporation formed by the manufacturers of materials and packaging, packagers and distributors, in probable percentages of 20, 60% to 20%. Of Eco-envases comprise all manufacturers of containers and their materials such as glass, wood, aluminium, Tetrapack, paper, Tin and plastic, each with their own society. As mentioned, that of plastics will be called Cicloplast.

Lluís Alonso