The Alliance to End Plastic Waste, including companies like Dow and Greiner, hopes to support innovation and regulations around the world.
Whilst the Great Pacific Garbage Patch may be the most well known of its kind, it’s certainly not the only one.
By 2050, another 33 billion tonnes of plastic are projected to accumulate on the planet.
The Alliance to End Plastic Waste is composed of more than 80 member organisations and aims to tackle this problem.
Jörg Sabo, Global Director of Marketing & Innovation at Greiner, a member of the Alliance, says: “Supporting the Alliance to End Plastic Waste reinforces our commitment to reducing waste and advancing recycling initiatives, ensuring that plastics remain valuable resources within the circular loop and not pollutants in the environment”.
Based in Singapore, the Alliance was launched in 2019 and seeks to create a circular economy for plastics.
Chemicals giant Dow is a founding member of the Alliance, hoping to improve infrastructure and innovation for plastic waste worldwide.
Linda Lim, Global Strategic Partnerships Director, Sustainability at Dow, says: “It takes ambitious private sector and government targets to catalyse change in ending plastic pollution.
“However, it is policies that will drive the necessary investments in innovation and infrastructure to unlock circularity.
“It is not easy to transition to a circular economy, and ongoing efforts by the Alliance, together with progressive governments and communities, have made impact.”
Justin Wood is the Alliance’s Vice President and Head of Europe, Middle East and Africa.
He joined in 2020 and is responsible for developing strategy, raising funds, developing partnerships and building a portfolio of high-impact projects to address plastic pollution.
Justin shares his expertise with us.
Where does the Alliance see its role in implementing the International Legally Binding Instrument (ILBI) on plastic pollution?
Once member states have agreed on the ILBI, our focus will be on supporting governments with implementation. Specifically, we want to share learnings from on-the-ground projects to demonstrate what is possible and what is needed to increase plastic waste collection and recycling rates.
The ILBI will call for a full suite of solutions, from the reduction of plastic usage to re-use and refill models as well as recycling. We have particular expertise in designing and implementing the end-of-life solutions that will be needed, which extends into many other areas of a circular economy, such as how to design products to make them more recyclable.
Having supported more than 80 projects pioneering waste management and recycling solutions across the world, the Alliance is now cataloguing key insights into a series of Solution Model playbooks, which were developed in collaboration with the Boston Consulting Group (BCG).
For example, the playbook, ‘Engaging Households in Segregated Municipal Waste Collection’, summarises learnings from Alliance projects in Argentina, China, India and Indonesia, outlining ways to optimise household waste segregation in order to enhance the volume and quality of recycling feedstock. Ensuring a reliable supply of clean feedstock streams is vital in making recycling economically viable, hence why it is pivotal for countries to have strong waste management systems that allow for the segregation of waste streams, pre- or post-collection.
How can countries be supported in their efforts to implement plastic waste roadmaps?
Seeing as countries have diverse national and sub-national circumstances, there is no single panacea to eliminating plastic waste in the environment. The Alliance explores this idea further in our Plastic Waste Management Framework, developed with the support of Roland Berger. Based on a global meta-analysis of 192 countries, the Framework identifies six categories of waste management and recycling maturities, ranging from Category I (‘Undeveloped Systems’) to Category VI (‘Developed Performing Systems’).
The Framework outlines potential pathways for countries to improve, or even leapfrog, plastic waste collection and recycling rates. Policies and actions specific to each maturity category, such as the inclusion of the informal sector for Category I to III countries and Extended Producer Responsibility and Deposit Return Systems for Category III to V countries, are some examples of how the Framework accounts for the unique circumstances that each maturity category faces and the corresponding measures that can be taken to put the ILBI to action.
What funding is needed to address plastic waste?
An estimated US$2.1tn is needed by 2040 to eliminate plastic leakage into the environment – a significant but not insurmountable challenge. Countries across the globe are hindered by chronic underinvestment in waste management infrastructure, particularly collection infrastructure, which is the least profitable and therefore the most underfunded aspect of waste management.
Collaboration and the use of innovative financing mechanisms have the potential to help raise the capital required, as demonstrated by our approach to impact finance. In our projects, our goal is to combine our funding with that from other parties, and to date we have catalysed US$368m in capital from third parties in the public and private sectors.
The Alliance often makes grants or concessional rate loans to de-risk projects, thereby unlocking capital from third parties that might otherwise be hesitant to invest and allowing the Alliance’s capital to be blended with the capital of others in powerful and creative combinations.
For example, in 2023, the Alliance helped to unlock a blue loan of US$44.9m from the Asian Development Bank (ADB) to fund a new food-grade rPET bottle-to-bottle recycling plant by PT ALBA Tridi in Central Java, Indonesia. The local founder company and minority shareholder, Dhara Daya Sustainea, faced equity requirements it could not meet. Due to its lack of credit history, commercial loans were inaccessible or offered at prohibitively high rates. We stepped in to provide a US$4m concessional subordinated shareholder loan, which enabled PT ALBA Tridi to meet their equity contributions and unlock the loan from ADB.
What is the role of innovation in tackling the plastic waste issue?
Innovation plays a critical role in enhancing waste management systems, enabling countries to develop new solutions that increase the effectiveness and efficiency of collection, waste-processing and end-of-life infrastructure. The small handful of countries classified under Category VI of our Plastic Waste Management Framework are the closest to achieving full plastics circularity and therefore, well positioned to trial innovations in waste management and recycling technologies.
Innovative solutions such as marking, digitalisation and gamification are pivotal to making waste disposal more convenient and improve the overall effectiveness and efficiency of waste collection. In terms of enhancing waste treatment infrastructure, advanced sorting technologies, such as digital watermarking and AI object recognition, are promising developments that could potentially address the challenges flexible plastic and multi-layer packaging present.
For example, digital watermarks, like AIM’s HolyGrail 2.0, are imperceptible codes that cover the surface of a packaging item that can be identified by high-resolution cameras in a post-disposal sorting process. Early trials have shown that these have the potential to significantly improve sortation rates, which is essential to providing clean feedstock streams for recycling.
However, it is important to note that innovation is not synonymous with technology. Most of the countries that fall under Category I to III of the Framework are aware that technical solutions for basic waste collection and recycling already exist. The challenge developing markets face is an economic one – where both financial interventions and innovations must be made to create business models that make waste management and recycling solutions effective and affordable.
