6. The policy landscape
Policy makers around the world are looking for effective instruments to tackle the environmental pressures from the production, consumption and end-of-life management of plastics. This chapter describes the policy approaches and key instruments available to address these issues. It takes stock of the current global policy landscape and lays out a policy roadmap to reduce the leakage of land-based macroplastics and to make the lifecycle of plastics more circular.
Plastics have a wide range of environmental impacts, with leakage of macroplastics into the environment as a top priority to governments. Reducing these impacts requires a comprehensive set of complementary policy instruments, grouped into restraining demand, designing for circularity, enhancing recycling, closing leakage pathways and cleaning up.
An inventory of economic and regulatory measures across 50 countries, representing 69% of the global population and 84% of global gross domestic product (GDP), suggests that the current policy landscape for plastics is fragmented and can be strengthened significantly.
Restraining demand can bring the largest environmental gains: fewer plastics in use mean less embodied energy, fewer health risks and less plastic waste to deal with. Plastics taxes, recycled content targets and extended producer responsibility (EPR) with fee modulation schemes can all create financial incentives to reduce use and foster circularity. Only a few countries are experimenting with these innovative economic instruments and targets – their adoption needs to be extended to more products and more countries.
Recycling can be encouraged through financial incentives. EPR, landfill taxes and incineration taxes work well for enterprises and municipalities. However, only 33 out of the 50 analysed countries (representing 18% of the population covered by the inventory) have national regulations and operational schemes for EPR in place, while 25 countries (representing 11% of the covered population) have effectively implemented national landfill and incineration taxes. Households can be encouraged to sort plastic waste at source through deposit-refund and Pay-as-You-Throw schemes. Yet only 13 countries (representing 4% of the covered population) are subject to such schemes.
While bans and taxes on single-use plastics are a popular approach to reducing litter – having been implemented globally by more than 120 countries – they only target a small share of plastics by volume and may not always have positive environmental outcomes. Enlarging the scope of anti-littering policies and enhancing implementation of legislation on the ground is needed to structurally reduce plastics littering.
Leakage pathways can be closed by investing in basic waste management infrastructure. With mismanaged waste a widespread problem, especially in developing economies, major investments in infrastructure are needed, combined with support for effective legal frameworks to enforce disposal obligations for all economic actors.
Our analysis concludes with a roadmap which can be adopted by all countries. It involves three increasingly ambitious phases: 1) close leakage pathways: build sanitary waste management infrastructure, organise waste collection and ban or tax frequently littered items; 2) create incentives for recycling and enhance sorting at source; and 3) restrain demand and optimise design to make plastic value chains more circular and recycled plastics more price competitive.
The production, consumption and end-of-life management of plastics generate a wide range of environmental impacts, including greenhouse gas emissions, water and air pollution, and the release of hazardous chemicals. The most notorious negative effect of plastics is the increased mortality of marine species, due to entanglement in floating plastic debris or ingestion of plastic particles. But plastic litter in the marine environment also has substantial economic costs due to negative impacts on tourism and fishing (Krelling, Williams and Turra, 2017[1]). Human health concerns have also emerged over certain plastic additives and substances being inhaled, or ingested in food.
Of the many of impacts of plastics use, the release of plastic waste and litter into the environment is one of the issues currently of most concern to governments. To address this issue, there are essentially five policy approaches that can be used (Figure 6.1):
Restrain demand: reduce the excessive amount of plastics and other materials in use by promoting longer product lifespans, reuse, a demand shift to services and other upstream measures.
Design for circularity: make the plastic production process more circular by avoiding hazardous materials in the lifecycle, maximising recycled content and adopting other design measures.
Enhance recycling: close material loops by sorting and recycling plastic waste.
Close leakage pathways: decrease losses into the environment through, among others, effective waste plastic collection and disposal (e.g. disposal in sanitary landfills) and effective waste water treatment plants (WWTP).
Clean up: remove plastic from the environment, e.g. via beach clean-up activities or installing river litter booms that capture plastics before they flow into oceans.
Policies to address microplastics are much less well evolved than policies for macroplastics. There remains significant uncertainty about the effectiveness of measures that can be used to mitigate unintentionally released microplastics (e.g. those that occur during production and use, such as releases of microfibres when garments are washed) (OECD, 2021[2]). As a consequence, there is also uncertainty about which policy approaches are best suited to address microplastic leakage. This chapter therefore focuses on land-based macroplastics and only includes microbeads incorporated into cosmetics and detergents because these microplastics can easily be replaced with more environmentally friendly materials. Voluntary and regulatory approaches to phase out and substitute intentionally added microbeads are already becoming widespread.
Reducing the negative impacts of macroplastics requires intervention through a broad array of policy instruments (Figure 6.2). Some of these instruments specifically target plastics, whereas others have a broader scope and address a wider range of waste or material types. For instance, bans and taxes on single-use plastics are very targeted and aim to diminish the use of items such as plastic bags, while landfill taxes usually address solid waste more generally with the aim to discourage disposal and encourage recycling or energy recovery.
Sectoral policies, such as for chemicals, waste management, agriculture or construction, can also be useful, as can policies that address specific externalities, such as a carbon tax aiming to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Some policies are more relevant at local or national levels (e.g. waste management legislation), whereas others are implemented at the international level (e.g. trade rules for plastic waste).
None of the policy instruments that have been selected for this review of the plastics policy landscape will be highly effective on their own – they need to be embedded in a broader policy mix which combines a number of mutually supportive and complementary instruments. In addition to steering policy instruments (such as legally binding regulatory interventions, mandatory standards and economic instruments), a range of enabling and soft policies – such as research and development (R&D) investment, communication, nudging and education measures, voluntary approaches and stakeholder alliances – are also needed (Figure 6.3).
The review and assessment of a limited set of policy instruments in this report (predominantly regulatory and economic instruments) is a substantial simplification. Nevertheless, regulatory and economic instruments are essential to provide the right incentive structure for an environmentally sound plastics economy and the presence of these instruments usually correlates with reduced mismanaged plastic waste and greater plastics recycling rates, amongst others (Watkins et al., 2012[3]).
The OECD has recently developed a Plastics Policy Inventory to analyse steering policy instruments. The inventory contains key economic and regulatory policy instruments that are exclusively focused on plastics, as well as broader instruments that target products and waste streams, such as municipal solid waste (MSW), that contain important fractions of plastics. It covers policy in 50 countries: the 38 OECD member countries, as well as 12 non-OECD countries selected for the size of their populations and their geographic coverage (Brazil, the People’s Republic of China, India, Indonesia, Russia and South Africa, as well as several countries with large populations in South-East Asia and Africa) (Table 6.1). Overall, the inventory covers 69% of the world’s population and 84% of global GDP. The policy inventory relies on an extensive literature review, including the OECD Policy Instruments for the Environment (PINE) database (OECD, 2021[4]), UNEP (2018[5]), Cornago et al. (2021[6]), OECD (forthcoming[7]), Ecoprog (2020[8]) and Karasik et al. (2020[9]). Moreover, for the non-OECD countries, local experts provided individual country case studies to validate and expand the information in the inventory. The inventory includes policies that came into force before December 2020. Despite the extensive research, gaps in the inventory or issues with classification are still possible, so all results need to be interpreted with care (Box 6.1).
This section draws on the analysis of the inventory to assess the global plastics policy landscape and highlight gaps that need to be addressed, based on the five key policy areas shown in Figure 6.1.
Mapping and comparing the use of policy instruments in different countries can yield valuable insights and best practices. However, global inventories of polices encounter a range of difficulties:
Not all policies stated in policy documents are operational in practice.
Existing economic or industrial policies are sometimes rebranded as “circular” without actually including new circular obligations.
In countries with a federal structure, there can be diversity in regulations adopted by the states, provinces or regions.
Enabling policies such as communication campaigns are sometimes heralded as flagship actions without assessing their impact.
The benefits of upstream measures to restrain demand and promote eco-design are often intangible.
Definitions, available data, measurement methodologies and framework conditions relating to materials and waste management differ structurally between countries.
Consequently, international policy inventories can highlight key circular economy trends, but should be interpreted with care.
6.2.1. Current bans and taxes on single-use items are insufficient to restrain demand
The largest environmental gains can be achieved by reducing excessive use of plastics. Fewer plastics in use mean less embodied energy, fewer health risks and less plastic waste to deal with. However, steering production and consumption patterns requires sophisticated policies that take into account international trade and potentially undesirable side-effects.
Many countries have taken measures to curb the use of microbeads in rinse-off applications, and single-use items such as straws or polystyrene food packaging. However, most attention has been paid to single-use plastic shopping bags. According to UNEP (2020[10]), 127 countries have already issued legislation to either ban, tax or regulate the use of plastic shopping bags. This includes emerging markets such as Botswana, Mongolia and Yemen. However, not all of these regulations are fully implemented or enforced (OECD, 2021[11]). Moreover, an exclusive focus on plastics can lead to other materials being used instead, rather than to a reduction overall (Box 6.2). Most importantly, these measures focus on small product streams, which means that while they may reduce littering, they have less impact on total volumes in use.
There are plenty of soft measures used to restrain demand and use resources more efficiently. For example, communication and nudging strategies are being used to promote reuse and product sharing services (PBM, 2020[12]). However, despite frequent calls for “plastics taxes”, there are no economy-wide taxes or obligations that steer consumption structurally away from plastics. This is partly due to the complexity of introducing taxes in an international market and the potential disadvantages of material substitution (Box 6.2). On the other hand, there are still many examples of fossil fuel subsidies that incentivise overconsumption by keeping the prices of plastics feedstock low (OECD/IEA, 2021[13]).
The case of plastic shopping bags highlights how an exclusive focus on plastic products can induce substitution without reducing the overall footprint of consumption. In recent years, taxes on single-use plastic shopping bags have been successfully implemented in many parts of the world (IEEP, 2017[14]). However, in some cases the exclusive focus on plastics has induced a shift to other materials, rather than reducing materials consumption overall. For example, a 2009 litter study found that the introduction of a partial ban on polystyrene cups in San Francisco reduced littered polystyrene cups, but also prompted a sharp increase in the littering of paper cups instead (HDR, 2009[15]; Cornago, Börkey and Brown, 2021[6]).
The use of plastics is often perceived by consumers as the least favourable alternative for packaging, but there are many cases where this intuition is contradicted by life cycle analyses (LCAs) (Boesen, Bey and Niero, 2019[16]; Stefanini et al., 2020[17]). For example, a recent meta-analysis of seven LCAs concludes that single-use polyethylene (PE) bags have lower climate impact and cause less acidification, eutrophication and ozone-related impacts than non-plastic single-use alternatives such as paper bags, mainly because of their much lighter weight (UNEP, 2020[18]). Therefore, legislation that targets products such as shopping bags should take into account possible substitution effects and aim to incentivise reuse (Cornago, Börkey and Brown, 2021[6]).
6.2.2. Innovative policies are needed to encourage design for circularity
Design is deeply entrenched in both production and sales processes, and affects the environmental footprint of plastics throughout their lifecycle. Product norms, regulatory risk assessment schemes and bans on hazardous substances are in place in many countries. Although these regulatory instruments are critical to detoxify materials’ lifecycles (Box 6.3), they are only able to affect a tiny share of the substances that generate health risks (Wiesinger, Wang and Hellweg, 2021[19]). Moreover, the multitude of products and the speed of innovation make it challenging for regulatory instruments to steer design processes. Therefore, several countries are exploring how to apply innovative economic instruments and binding targets to foster the design of more circular products. For instance:
France uses EPR (Box 6.4) to incentivise eco-design. By modulating EPR fees, i.e. recycling contributions paid by producers, circular product designs receive a bonus or penalty depending on their design criteria (Laubinger et al., 2021[20]). Similar eco-modulation measures are in place or envisioned in Canada (Quebec), Chile, Estonia, Italy and Portugal (Box 6.4). However, more research is needed to substantiate the effectiveness of the measure for instigating design changes.
In 2022, the United Kingdom will apply a GBP 200 per tonne tax on packaging plastics that contain less than 30% recycled content.
The European Union has launched several new regulations:
A directive1 which obliges Member States to introduce modulated EPR fees that take into account, where possible, a product’s durability, reparability, re-usability and recyclability, as well as the presence of hazardous substances. Guidance on how to implement modulated EPR fees is currently being drafted (Laubinger et al., 2021[20]).
A mandatory 25% recycled content target for polyethylene terephthalate (PET) bottles by 2025 and 30% for all beverage bottles by 2030.2
California is the first US state to impose a recycled content target for plastics in beverage containers. The target will start at 15% in 2022 and climb to 50% in 2050.
The selection of chemicals at the design stage determines health and environmental impacts along the entire lifecycle of a product (OECD, 2021[21]). For example, orthophthalates or phthalates are a large group of chemicals that can, among other things, be used as a plasticiser for PVC to make the rigid material flexible. Applications include electrical wires, gloves, toys and flexible flooring tiles as well as cosmetics and personal care products. Phthalate use is widespread and biomonitoring of urine samples shows that we take up significant volumes via ingestion and other routes of exposure (Holland, 2018[22]; CDC, 2021[23]; 2021[24]). Some phthalates, such as DEHP, BBP and DBP, have proven adverse health effects (e.g. reduced long-term fertility), with high frequency of exposure, high concentrations and cumulative exposure to different phthalates increasing the risks (Benjamin et al., 2017[25]; Engel et al., 2021[26]; Silano et al., 2019[27]). Clearly, the use of such hazardous substances in plastics and plastic products raises concerns at the production, use and waste stages. Risk assessments to better understand potential impacts, government regulations to restrict their use and industry commitments to phase out such hazardous substances, are critical to achieving safer and more circular materials.
Regulatory and industrial efforts to detoxify material loops are, however, hampered by several problems. The first issue is the international disparity of policies, as illustrated by the example of phthalates. For example, Australia restricts the use of DEHP in plastics applications for children to a maximum weight-based level of 1% (Australian Competition & Consumer Commission, 2021[28]; Commonwealth of Australia, 2011[29]). This regulation is complemented by a voluntary commitment by the Australian PVC industry to phase out phthalates in food contact packaging, and to phase out the more mobile and potentially more hazardous low-weight phthalates1 from all applications by 2023 (Vinyl Council Australia, 2018[30]). The United Kingdom and European Union also have legal restrictions in place for several phthalates.2 In the EU the maximum weight-based level for DEHP, in combination with other targeted phthalates, is 0.1% for toys and childcare applications, as well as for some other consumer applications. In addition, the European PVC industry has succeeded in almost phasing out low molecular phthalates by substituting them with high molecular weight phthalates and non-phthalate plasticisers (Vinyl Plus, 2021[31]; INERIS, 2021[32]). In contrast, in most non-OECD countries there are no restrictions in place and low molecular phthalates are still widely used in consumer applications. In 2016, DEHP was not only the largest plasticiser, with global consumption estimated at 3 million tonnes, but sales volumes were still growing (Polymers, 2017[33]). Such disparate regulatory frameworks incur compliance costs but leave health risks unaddressed on a global level. For example, in 2017, inspectors contributing to an EU-wide project co-ordinated by the European Chemical Agency (ECHA), analysed almost 5 000 imported articles and found that 18% contained non-compliant chemical substances. The most frequent breach concerned high concentrations of phthalates in toys (ECHA, 2018[34]). International co-operation to align regulations and market conditions is needed to prevent health hazards while generating efficiency gains by removing obstacles to trade (Chapter 7).
A second important barrier to the detoxification of material loops is the presence of historical hazardous substances in the economy. For example, at the end-of-life stage, the presence of DEHP in recycled plastics has created controversy regarding trade-offs between the benefits of removing hazardous substances from materials loops, and the need to increase recycling rates. The granting of authorisations for use of recycled soft PVC containing DEHP in the EU has led to public debate and even legal disputes (Chemical Watch, 2021[35]; European Parliament, 2015[36]). Proactively designing plastics with a sustainable chemistry perspective will reduce misalignment and lessen the need to deal with legacy chemical issues in the future.
← 1. High weight molecular phthalates that have longer chemical chains such as DINP and DIDP have more limited health hazards (ECHA, 2013[79]) and are less mobile within the plastic which reduces potential exposure (van den Driesche et al., 2020[78]).
← 2. Including EU Regulation 2018/2005 and the US Toxic Substances Control Act.
The OECD defines EPR as an environmental policy approach that gives producers financial or physical responsibility for a product’s entire lifecycle, including the treatment or disposal of post-consumer products (OECD, 2001[37]) (Figure 6.4). EPR has been successfully implemented to increase recycling rates in a range of countries and across a diversity of products, such as packaging, batteries, cars, electronics and tyres (Kaffine and O’Reilly, 2015[38]).
The most common type of EPR works by imposing recycling targets or other obligations on producers to internalise external costs and create a stable financing framework for recycling. Consumers pay for waste management at the moment of procurement, rather than at the moment of disposal, which is difficult to monitor.
Despite its success in many high-income countries, several announced EPR regulations have been abandoned in emerging economies, due to, among other reasons, weak institutions and resistance by stakeholders (OECD, 2016[39]). Following the public call to action on plastics, several organisations representing international companies have taken bold positions in favour of EPR, including the Consumer Goods Forum (2020[40]) and the Ellen MacArthur Foundation (2021[41]). The support of such stakeholders stresses the potential of EPR to foster the circular use of plastics and may give the impetus to promote EPR implementation across the world.
In pursuing economies of scale, most EPR schemes are organised industry-wide, which severs the link between product design and recycling liabilities for individual producers. Consequently, without further intervention, producers have few financial incentives to invest in eco-design (OECD, 2016[39]). Modulating EPR fees (i.e. recycling contribution) is one way forward, allowing producers with a more circular design to pay a lower EPR fee. Several countries are experimenting with modulated EPR fees, but their implementation needs to be scaled up to have substantial impact (Laubinger et al., 2021[20]):
Quebec, Canada (packaging): fee reduced by 20% for packaging that is entirely manufactured with recycled content.
Estonia (packaging): Reusable packaging does not need to be declared as long as it is reused effectively.
France (packaging): 100% fee increase for non-recyclable material (per national guidelines) and opaque PET with >4% mineral filler.
France (textiles): 50% fee reduction for textiles and shoes with 15% recycled fibres/materials.
France (electronics): 20% fee reduction for a washing machine or dish washer with spare parts available up to 11 years, or post-consumer recycled content > 10%.
Portugal (packaging): 10% penalty applied to PET bottles with PVC label or metal cap, and glass bottles with stopper made of ceramic or steel.
Chile (packaging): bonus/malus based on recyclability and recycled content of packaging.
6.2.3. Recycling and sorting can be enhanced by making them profitable
Plastics are only recycled on a large scale if it is profitable to do so. Economic and regulatory policy instruments can ensure a business case for collecting and recycling plastic waste. Moreover, incentivising sorting at source is a critical lever because the quality of sorting determines the purity and value of recycled materials, and therefore the profitability of recycling operations.
Table 6.1 combines data from the OECD Plastics Policy Inventory with the fraction of municipal solid waste that is mismanaged per country (Kaza et al., 2018[42]). It suggests that there is significant scope for countries to further strengthen their policy frameworks for recycling:
Recycling incentives for enterprises and municipalities can be strengthened effectively by EPR, landfill taxes and incineration taxes (Box 6.4 and Box 6.5). However, Table 6.1 highlights that these well-known policy instruments operate on a national scale only in a limited number of countries, covering 11% of the population in the global inventory, or 42% of the OECD population.
Sorting at source by households can be enhanced effectively by deposit-refund systems for beverage bottles and Pay-as-You-Throw schemes, i.e. schemes where citizens have to pay a variable cost per kg or per bag of mixed waste (Box 6.5). (ACR plus, 2019[43]; Zhou et al., 2020[44]). For example, deposit-refund systems for beverage bottles can increase collection rates beyond 90% and reduce litter rates substantially (Reloop Platform, 2020[45]). However, Table 6.1 shows that only 4% of the population covered in the global inventory have at least one of these instruments in place on a national scale.
Pay-as-You-Throw encourages sorting at source in Belgium
In Belgium, Pay-as-You-Throw is a central pillar of the policy portfolio to encourage citizens to sort their waste. Flanders, one of Belgium’s three regions, mandates municipalities to set a variable price for mixed waste collection of between EUR 0.11 and 0.33 per kg. Therefore, for a single 10kg bag of mixed waste, the cost could reach EUR 3.3 (Government of Flanders, 2021[46]). These financial incentives, combined with other measures, have led to one of the highest sorting and material recovery rates in Europe and the world (Eurostat, 2021[47]; OECD, 2021[48]). A crucial success factor is combining Pay-as-You-Throw with sustained awareness campaigns and enforcement measures to avoid mixed waste being disposed of in recycling receptacles or dumped in the street to avoid paying the variable fee. A fixed annual fee to finance waste management does not qualify as Pay-as-You-Throw because it does not give financial incentives to sort waste.
The landfill tax discourages landfilling in the United Kingdom
The UK introduced a landfill tax in 1996 and has gradually increased the rates over time. The standard rate for 2021 reached GBP 96.7 per tonne. This landfill “ladder” is considered a key driver of the reduction of the share of MSW landfilled from 86% (440 kg per inhabitant) in 1996 to 15% (69 kg per inhabitant) in 2018 (UK Government, 2021[49]).
Landfill taxes can only be successful when illegal dumping can be countered by effective regulation and operational control mechanisms.
The plastic bag tax as a game-changer for plastic bag littering in Ireland
In 2002, Ireland introduced a tax of EUR 0.15 on single-use plastic bags. This acted as a direct incentive to consumers to reduce the amount of shopping bags consumed and littering fell sharply. Discarded plastic bags amounted to about 5% of litter pollution in 2001 but dropped to less than 0.5% after 2003 (OECD, 2021[50]).
Table 6.1. The use of key policy instruments to enhance recycling is disparate across the world |
|---|
 |
Source: OECD Plastics Policy Inventory and (Kaza et al., 2018[42]). |
In addition to the economic and regulatory instruments showcased in Table 6.1, several countries also rely on voluntary initiatives or agreements with the private sector. For example, in Australia the packaging industry has committed to recycle 70% of packaging and use 50% recycled content by 2025. These targets are nationally agreed and have subsequently steered government policies, actions and investments. The packaging industry is proactively engaged in achieving the targets (APCO, 2022[51]). Although such voluntary initiatives contribute strongly to enhancing the circularity of products, they are categorised as “enabling” instruments, rather than steering policy instruments and are therefore not captured in Table 6.1. Voluntary initiatives tend to be smaller in scope than schemes driven by legal obligations and follow, or sometimes even prevent, policy initiatives, rather than leading the transition to more circularity (OECD, 2003[52]; Hickle, 2013[53]; Nash and Bosso, 2013[54]).
6.2.4. Leakage pathways can be closed by investing in basic waste management infrastructure
The most basic but also most critical step for mitigating health hazards and plastic leakage is to build infrastructure for safe disposal of waste, including plastics (typically sanitary landfills), and ensuring that mixed waste is collected for transport to these facilities. As shown in Table 6.1, Kaza et al. (2018[42]) estimate that more than 10% of MSW is mismanaged in countries representing 80% of the global population covered in the inventory. Moreover, in countries accounting for 18% of the covered population, more than 50% of MSW is mismanaged. Within the OECD, mismanaged waste is also an important challenge, with countries that account for 21% of the OECD’s population still mismanaging more than 10% of their waste. As highlighted in Box 6.6, an integrated set of policies and sustained effort is needed to address this issue. Chapter 7 also discusses the role of international co-operation to enhance basic waste management infrastructure in developing countries. In addition, banning or limiting the use of frequently littered plastic products is a simple and widely used measure (Section 6.2.1).
Dumpsites and uncontrolled landfills used to be the most common places for disposing of mixed waste in Brazil. Although there still is a long road ahead, Brazil has made significant progress in dealing with mismanaged waste, especially in the first decade of the 2000s (Figure 6.5). Between 2000 and 2019, Brazil increased the share of waste disposed in sanitary landfills from 38% to 60% (ABRELPE, 2003[55]; ABRELPE, 2020[56]).
Source: (ABRELPE, 2003[55]; ABRELPE, 2020[56]).
The significant progress between 2000 and 2010 was achieved via a combination of policies and stakeholder actions. In 1998, a Federal Law made the inappropriate disposal of solid waste an environmental crime (Presidência da República, 1998[57]). A wider coverage of legislation and political attention resulted in inspections of municipal bodies, closures of open-air dumps and increased financial support for new sanitary landfills from the federal government (Neto, Petter and Cortina, 2009[58]). Another important piece of legislation, the National Sanitation Policy, was enacted in 2007 and defined basic sanitary conditions including provision of adequate solid waste management (Presidência da República, 2007[59]).
After 2010, it seemed difficult to sustain the momentum although some new policies were initiated. In 2010, the National Policy on Solid Waste (NPSW) was launched (Presidência da República, 2010[60]), but implementation of this progressive piece of legislation fell short of expectations (Alfaia, Costa and Campos, 2017[61]; Pereira et al., 2020[62]). Two major obstacles were local authorities’ lack of expertise and financial means. In order to provide more incentives for circular (plastic) waste management in Brazil, the regulatory framework, enforcement of obligations on the ground and implementation of economic instruments need to be strengthened (World Bank, 2018[63]).
6.2.5. Cleaning up leaked plastics is expensive and only a policy of last resort
Beach clean-up campaigns and litter removal are often organised by stakeholders and NGOs. Few steering policy measures have focused on cleaning up leaked plastics as it is expensive (Table 6.2) and preventing pollution in the first place is more structural. Nonetheless several EPR regulations for packaging and EPR oblige producers to organise and finance the cleaning up of litter (Box 6.7).
EU Directive 2019/9041 focuses on the ten most commonly found plastic items on beaches plus fishing gear. From the second half of 2021, it gradually started to phase in bans (among other measures) for plastic cotton bud sticks, cutlery, plates, straws, stirrers, balloon sticks, expanded polystyrene for food and beverage containers and cups. It will also impose a 25% recycled content target for beverage bottles and the development of EPR systems for balloons, tobacco products with filters and wet wipes to discourage pollution and finance the clean-up of litter.
← 1. https://ec.europa.eu/environment/topics/plastics/single-use-plastics_en.
The regulatory and economic instruments discussed in Section 6.2 can affect recycling and littering, but the depth of their impact on both aspects differs strongly for each instrument. If it is to increase the overall recycling rate of plastics substantially, a policy instrument must target a large share of plastic waste. For example, policies that target all plastics in MSW have a high potential to increase recycling. In contrast, policies to discourage littering must target items that are frequently littered, though these often only represent a small share of overall plastic waste. A good example is cigarette butts.
Figure 6.6. plots a selection of steering policy instruments against these two dimensions to highlight their differences. The size of the bubbles illustrates how often a policy is used in countries covered in the Plastics Policy Inventory. Only regulatory country-wide systems or systems operating at state, region or province level are taken into account (Table 6.1). The most recurring policy measure is to ban or tax single-use shopping bags (applied in 45 out of the 50 countries in the inventory), followed by EPR regulations (34 out of 50) for packaging and durables (e.g. electronics, cars, batteries or tyres), bans or taxes on other single use items (31 out of 50) and landfill or incineration taxes (31 out of 50).
Since the size of the bubble is driven by the number of countries that have the policy instrument in place, the bubble size should be interpreted as the instrument’s popularity with policy makers, rather than its coverage of global plastics. Most steering instruments taken up in the inventory apply across the whole country, but some only apply to part of the country. For example, the 34 countries with EPR in place, include one country with provincial schemes, and the 31 countries with landfill and incineration taxes include 6 countries that only have waste taxes in place in some provinces or regions (Table 6.1).
The horizontal axis in Figure 6.6. shows the share of global plastics that can be targeted by these policy instruments. Regulatory and economic instruments that target a large share of plastics can have a strong positive impact on overall recycling rates:
Landfill and incineration taxes are effective at fostering recycling and target a large share of total plastic waste because they can affect both MSW and industrial waste streams. The rates of taxes applied vary significantly across countries and waste streams – for example, from a couple of USD per tonne for landfilling inert materials to over EUR 100 per tonne for mixed waste fractions in some countries (Box 6.5). Waste incineration taxes are implemented less often, but can internalise the environmental impacts of incineration in an efficient way (Dubois, 2013[69]). Tax rates on waste incineration are often lower than for landfilling. Typical rates are around EUR 10 per tonne of waste incinerated, though higher rates exist. The new EU tax on non-recycled plastics of EUR 800 per tonne is essentially also a tax on landfilling and waste incineration, as they are the most direct alternatives to recycling. However, this tax is imposed on the EU Member States and it is up to them to decide whether they cascade this cost down to the waste generators.
Pay-as-You-Throw can be a highly effective measure to encourage sorting of plastic waste by households. Many plastics are directly or indirectly managed by households and Pay-as-You-Throw gives them a strong financial signal to minimise and sort waste streams (Box 6.5). The small size of the bubble (only 13 countries out of 50, have a national, regional or provincial regulation in place) highlights that this instrument is vastly underused to enhance recycling.
EPR for packaging can target a substantial share of plastic waste because packaging accounts for almost one-third of plastics use and its lifecycle is short. Since the recycling rates of plastic packaging are substantially lower than for other packaging materials such as glass, metals or paper, substantial progress in recycling and circular design can be made by leveraging EPR (Box 6.4).
EPR is applied on a range of durable products, such as electronic equipment or cars. However, plastics are often only a small part of the material composition in durable products and current EPR systems mainly focus on the recovery of other materials such as metals. Integrating recycled content targets and recycling targets specific to plastics in EPR regulations would foster plastics recycling markets.
The vertical axis of Figure 6.6. focuses on the potential impact of regulatory and economic instruments on littering. The instruments are ranked in the figure by their potential impact on reducing the amount of litter, taking into account the occurrence of litter on beaches as counted during the Ocean Conservancy (2017[70]) coastal clean-up. The figure highlights that most instruments that target littering or other direct leakage to the environment focus on minor shares of total plastic waste:
Single-use shopping bags are highly visible but constitute only a small part of total plastic waste. For example, in the United States and Europe carrier bags accounted for less than 1% of total plastic waste in 2019 (EPA, 2020[71]; OECD, 2022[72]; Plastics Recyclers Europe, 2020[73]). Moreover, bans and taxes often only target bags with certain specifications (e.g. less than 35µm thick), which substantially limits the volumes of plastics concerned.
Bans and taxes on other frequently littered single-use items, such as polystyrene food boxes, plates, cups, straws and cigarettes, have the potential to prevent littering, but they target a limited fraction of total plastic waste. For example, in the United States plastic plates and cups accounted for less than 2% of total plastics in 2017 (EPA, 2020[71]; OECD, 2022[72]). Moreover, the policies often only target a small part of these product streams, thus the impact of bans on single-use items are more limited than often suggested.
The recent EU Single-Use Plastics Directive 2019/904 will impose EPR for tobacco products with filters from January 2023 (Box 6.7). The aim is to internalise the costs of cigarette butt littering. In all EU Member States, producers will have to cover at least the costs of raising awareness, cleaning up litter and monitoring results. The national regulation and operational start-up of the various EPR schemes in the Member States are currently underway. This measure will have an important impact on managing littered cigarette butts, but will have no impact on recycling.
Microbeads in rinse-off applications for personal care are designed to be removed with water and so enter the waste-water system. If WWTP are in place, most of these plastics are retained in the sludge,3 but if not they will end up in nature. A growing number of countries have introduced microbead bans, including Canada, China, France, Italy, New Zealand, Sweden, the United Kingdom and United States (Anagnosti et al., 2021[74]). Moreover, the European Chemical Agency made a proposal in 2020 for an EU-wide ban on intentionally added microplastics in a range of products (ECHA, 2020[75]). In most countries, the scope up to now is limited to rinse-off personal care and cosmetics, while cleaning products, which sometimes also contain microbeads, have been left untouched. Importantly, the bans have had global resonance, with leading international companies committing to phasing out microbeads throughout their global product portfolio. The effectiveness of the international policy measures is high, but the total volume concerned is tiny (representing less than 0.01% of all plastics). As a consequence, these measures succeed in reducing health and environmental risks, but do not contribute much to restraining overall plastics demand.
Some economic instruments can affect recycling and littering simultaneously, but they also have their limitations:
As discussed earlier, EPR for packaging is typically focused on increasing recycling rates, but increasingly the instrument is also used to shift the responsibility for littering towards producers. For example, packaging producers in Belgium have to finance anti-littering actions.4 However, the scope of this obligation is limited to packaging waste and does not contain binding measurable targets that have to be achieved.
Deposit-refund systems can induce high quality recycling or even reuse of beverage packaging while reducing littering. However, the scope is typically limited to beverage bottles, which only make up a limited share of total plastic waste. For example, in the United States PET bottles and jars accounted for less than 5% of total plastic waste in 2019 (EPA, 2020[71]; OECD, 2022[72]).
Measures that target highly visible streams such as single-use plastic bags attract ample policy attention. Many countries implement such measures and refer to them as flagship measures in the transition to a circular economy. These policy instruments indeed help to close leakage pathways by discouraging littering, but their impact on recycling or prevention is often limited because they target only a minor share of overall plastics use. To close material loops and enhance recycling structurally, wider implementation of landfill taxes, incineration taxes, Pay-as-You-Throw, deposit-refund schemes and EPR for packaging as well as for durables is needed. Moreover, the effects of these instruments can be further complemented by recycled content targets and other measures that encourage recycling by fostering the circular design of products.
The analysis allowed to develop a high-level roadmap to combat plastic pollution and increase the circularity of plastics along their entire lifecycle that policy makers can adapt to national conditions (Figure 6.7). It involves a phased approach that can be implemented over time to achieve increasingly ambitious policy objectives.
The roadmap emphasises the need for regulatory and economic policy instruments that can induce economy-wide behavioural changes. For successful implementation, these steering instruments need to be accompanied with enabling policies, such as investments in innovation, communication and collaboration with stakeholders. The roadmap clusters the key actions into three phases:
Close leakage pathways: the most basic step for mitigating health hazards and plastics pollution is to build sanitary waste management infrastructure, typically landfills, and organise waste collection (Watkins et al., 2019[76]). Moreover, by banning or taxing items that are frequently littered, leakage to the environment can be significantly reduced.
Create incentives for recycling and enhance sorting at source: recycling plastics only occurs on a large scale if it is profitable. Policy makers can apply taxes to landfill and incineration to make recycling more cost competitive. By also imposing EPR, policy makers can make producers responsible for recycling packaging and durable products such as cars, batteries, tyres and electronics. As the quality of collected waste streams drives the feasibility and profitability of recycling, countries can achieve much greater circularity by sharpening the financial incentives to sort waste at source. Deposit-refund systems give a strong financial incentive to return beverage bottles, while Pay-as-You-Throw makes mixed waste disposal by households expensive. If combined with policies to avoid dumping and contaminating other waste streams, making householders pay per bag or kilo of mixed waste is an effective way to incentivise sorting at source.
Restrain demand and optimise design: the largest environmental gains can be achieved by reducing the use of virgin materials and by improving product design (Watkins et al., 2019[76]). Removing support schemes for fossil-based plastics, such as shale gas subsidies (OECD, 2016[77]), will make plastic value chains more circular by restraining consumption and by making recycled plastics more price competitive. By removing hazardous substances and recycling inhibitors from plastics at the design stage, chemical hazards can be avoided and recycling rates can be increased. Several countries have launched advanced policies such as (single-use) plastic taxes, reuse incentives, recycled content targets and fee modulation in EPR systems, but their impact could be improved considerably by extending coverage to more product types, and more countries.
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Notes
← 1. Waste Framework Directive 2008/98/EC, amended by Directive 2018/851, Article 8a, 4b
← 2. Single-Use Plastics Directive, Article 6.5. For details see https://ec.europa.eu/environment/topics/plastics/single-use-plastics_en.
← 3. Although microplastics captured in sludge may eventually leak into the environment via land spreading.
← 4. For more information on the anti-litter campaigns in Belgium: https://www.fostplus.be/en, https://mooimakers.be/, https://www.bewapp.be/.