The promise of recycling sounds pretty amazing: today’s package becomes tomorrow’s package over and over and over again.  Except that we’re not currently delivering on that promise when it comes to plastics. As you likely know, our current mechanical system works very well for some plastics, but it’s not equipped to handle complex multi-layered packages, films or other innovations that have delivered countless product and consumer benefits. That means our current system struggles to create the amount of quality recycled content brands need to fulfill their recycled content goals.

So how can brands deliver on their recycled content goals, and deliver on the promise of recycling, without compromising the performance or quality of their packaging and products? Material-to-material molecular recycling is a key piece of the equation. By breaking plastics down to their molecular form, this process produces recycled content that looks like — and performs like — first-generation content. Better yet, molecular recycling enables the use of waste plastic in durable, refillable and reusable applications. Not only can molecular recycling help brands create better packaging solutions, it delivers these solutions with a lower environmental impact than first-generation, non-recycled materials.

In a fast-moving presentation, Matt Storey from Eastman will walk through our current recycling realities, how molecular recycling complements current recycling solutions and how it enables challenging applications in new ways.