To prevent pellet loss the treaty text must include:
Plastic pellets are lost at all stages of the plastics value chain. The EU needs to address this issue with an ambitious Plastic Pellets regulation.
Rethink Plastic’s position on the EU’s regulation to prevent pellet loss: To effectively reduce the environmental and economic burden of pellet loss, a comprehensive supply chain approach is essential to implement, with robust and binding measures for all operators at every stage of the supply chain, ensuring that those responsible for pollution are held accountable rather than leaving EU public authorities and citizens to pay. Such binding prevention steps will protect public health and ecosystems while cutting long-term costs for European communities by curbing the ongoing effects of microplastic pollution.
After yet another container loss, the shores of Galicia, Asturias and Cantabria
(Spain), along the Atlantic coast, are under siege from a relentless tide of
microplastics. Those small particles washing ashore are plastic pellets, which are
the raw material used to manufacture all plastic items.
Plastic pellets, whether derived from virgin material, recycled sources or biomass, constitute the primary building blocks for the majority of plastic products. The European Commission’s Proposal for a Regulation on preventing pellet losses to reduce microplastic pollution represents a necessary step towards addressing plastic pollution and the associated harms to human health and the environment. Plastic pellets, flakes, dust and powders are tiny and hazardous microplastics spilled and lost across the plastic supply chain, contributing to widespread, chronic and avoidable pollution impacting every EU country surveyed1. Effectively preventing pellet loss requires a comprehensive supply chain approach, applying measures to all operators at every stage of the supply chain.
The exponential expansion of the production of raw plastic materials since 2005 has resulted in
increased waste generation and over 170 trillion plastic particles in the world’s oceans. Virtually all plastic products are derived from plastic pellets, flakes and powders (hereinafter referred to simply as
pellets), meaning the transboundary shipment of pellets has also drastically expanded. Due to pellets’
size and current handling across the supply chain, they often end up in the environment and are one of
the largest sources of primary microplastic pollution. In response, the European Union (EU) should take
all necessary steps to regulate plastic pellets across the plastic supply chain and effectively reduce the
amount of pellets that end up in the environment.