Multimaterial Packaging Challenges and Waste Solutions

𝗠𝗼𝗱𝗲𝗿𝗻 𝗽𝗮𝗰𝗸𝗮𝗴𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗶𝘀 𝗯𝗿𝗶𝗹𝗹𝗶𝗮𝗻𝘁𝗹𝘆 𝗲𝗻𝗴𝗶𝗻𝗲𝗲𝗿𝗲𝗱. 𝘛𝘩𝘢𝘵’𝘴 𝘱𝘢𝘳𝘵𝘭𝘺 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘱𝘳𝘰𝘣𝘭𝘦𝘮. Packaging waste doesn’t really start at the bin. It starts much earlier. Usually at the 𝗱𝗲𝘀𝗶𝗴𝗻 𝘀𝘁𝗮𝗴𝗲. We’ve built packaging systems that are incredibly good at protecting products, extending shelf life, reducing transport impacts, and delivering convenience at scale. But many of those same design choices can make packaging difficult to collect, sort, and recycle in the real world. I’ve stood in sorting facilities looking at packaging labelled “𝘳𝘦𝘤𝘺𝘤𝘭𝘢𝘣𝘭𝘦” still struggling to move through the system economically at scale. Not necessarily because people put it in the wrong bin. But because the infrastructure, material combinations, collection systems, or end markets aren’t fully aligned yet. And this goes well beyond plastics. Flexible films, fibre-based packaging with barriers, composites, adhesives, inks, labels, lightweighting decisions, reuse systems… they all influence what actually happens at end of life. 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗶𝗻𝗱𝘂𝘀𝘁𝗿𝘆 𝗸𝗻𝗼𝘄𝘀 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝘀. That’s why so much work is now focused on: ♻️ 𝗱𝗲𝘀𝗶𝗴𝗻 𝗳𝗼𝗿 𝗿𝗲𝗰𝘆𝗰𝗹𝗮𝗯𝗶𝗹𝗶𝘁𝘆 ♻️ 𝗺𝗼𝗻𝗼-𝗺𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗮𝗹 𝗽𝗮𝗰𝗸𝗮𝗴𝗶𝗻𝗴 ♻️ 𝗿𝗲𝘂𝘀𝗲 𝗺𝗼𝗱𝗲𝗹𝘀 ♻️ 𝗲𝗰𝗼-𝗺𝗼𝗱𝘂𝗹𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗱 𝗘𝗣𝗥 ♻️ 𝘀𝘁𝗮𝗻𝗱𝗮𝗿𝗱𝗶𝘀𝗲𝗱 𝗰𝗼𝗹𝗹𝗲𝗰𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝘀 ♻️ 𝗯𝗲𝘁𝘁𝗲𝗿 𝘀𝗼𝗿𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗶𝗻𝗳𝗿𝗮𝘀𝘁𝗿𝘂𝗰𝘁𝘂𝗿𝗲 ♻️ 𝘀𝘁𝗿𝗼𝗻𝗴𝗲𝗿 𝗿𝗲𝗰𝘆𝗰𝗹𝗲𝗱 𝗺𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗮𝗹 𝗺𝗮𝗿𝗸𝗲𝘁𝘀 𝗖𝗶𝗿𝗰𝘂𝗹𝗮𝗿𝗶𝘁𝘆 𝗶𝘀 𝘂𝗹𝘁𝗶𝗺𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗹𝘆 𝗮 𝘄𝗵𝗼𝗹𝗲-𝘀𝘆𝘀𝘁𝗲𝗺𝘀 𝗰𝗵𝗮𝗹𝗹𝗲𝗻𝗴𝗲, 𝗻𝗼𝘁 𝗮 𝘀𝗶𝗻𝗴𝗹𝗲-𝗺𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗮𝗹 𝗱𝗲𝗯𝗮𝘁𝗲. Good packaging design now has to balance: • product protection • carbon impacts • material efficiency • recyclability • infrastructure reality • economics • regulation • consumer usability 𝘐𝘵'𝘴 𝘥𝘪𝘧𝘧𝘪𝘤𝘶𝘭𝘵, 𝘣𝘶𝘵 𝘪𝘵’𝘴 𝘢𝘭𝘴𝘰 𝘸𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘣𝘪𝘨𝘨𝘦𝘴𝘵 𝘰𝘱𝘱𝘰𝘳𝘵𝘶𝘯𝘪𝘵𝘪𝘦𝘴 𝘴𝘪𝘵. 𝗣𝗮𝗰𝗸𝗮𝗴𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗼𝘂𝘁𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗲𝘀 𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝘀𝗵𝗮𝗽𝗲𝗱 𝗹𝗼𝗻𝗴 𝗯𝗲𝗳𝗼𝗿𝗲 𝗱𝗶𝘀𝗽𝗼𝘀𝗮𝗹. 𝙁𝙤𝙡𝙡𝙤𝙬 𝙢𝙚 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘤𝘰𝘮𝘮𝘦𝘯𝘵𝘢𝘳𝘺 𝘰𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘤𝘪𝘳𝘤𝘶𝘭𝘢𝘳 𝘦𝘤𝘰𝘯𝘰𝘮𝘺, 𝘸𝘢𝘴𝘵𝘦, 𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘰𝘶𝘳𝘤𝘦𝘴, 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘮𝘰𝘳𝘦. #CircularEconomy #Packaging #PackagingDesign #Resources #Recycling #EPR #WasteManagement #Reuse #Sustainability

Everyday Products that are Recyclable in Theory… Not in Practice These 3 products are often labeled "recyclable"... but in reality: 🍟 Chips bags: <5% recycled - Why? Multilayer materials (plastic + aluminum) can't be separated by current recycling tech → incinerated or landfilled. 👕 Polyester clothing: <1% recycled - Why? Blended fibers (polyester + cotton) can't be sorted without precise data → ends up as waste. 📦 Black plastic packaging: 0% recycled - Why? Carbon pigments block optical sorters → invisible to recycling facilities. What are the systemic problems ? 1️⃣ Technical Complexity: Materials designed without end-of-life in mind. 2️⃣ Lack of Infrastructure: Facilities lack capacity to process these materials. 3️⃣ Missing Data: The core issue - Without material composition data, even advanced systems fail. The waste problem starts at the design stage. End-of-life is rarely considered: → A "freshness" aluminum layer makes chip bags unrecyclable → Polyester/cotton blends without clear labels can't be recycled → Undetectable black packaging becomes trash by default The Solution: Forward Thinking and Transparency 1️⃣ Demand Data: Brands must provide trusted material compositions (via material passports/QR codes/PCDS) 2️⃣ Design for Recycling: Use monomaterials and easily separable designs 3️⃣ Leverage Systems: Integrate effective take-back programs My Perspective ➡️ A product without data is waste. That's why #DigitalProductPassports (#DPPs) and #ProductCircularDataSheet (#PCDS, ISO 59040) are game-changers for scaling circular economy. As professionals and consumers, we can drive change by: ✅ Asking: "Is this truly recyclable - and how?" ✅ Choosing brands that transparently share material/recycling info What’s one ‘recyclable’ product you’ll think twice about now before purchasing ?

Beauty packaging has a dirty secret. It’s called waste colonialism. • Highly developed countries export hard-to-recycle plastic waste to nations with weaker environmental enforcement, often under the label of “recycling.” • In beauty, we design: Multi-material pumps Metallized components Mixed resin closures Complex assemblies that cannot be processed domestically at scale • Then we act surprised when recovery systems fail. • This isn’t just an environmental issue. It’s a design and leadership issue. • If your packaging cannot be responsibly processed in the market where it’s sold, your sustainability claims are fragile. • What actually moves the needle? • 1) Design for material simplicity from day one 2) Pressure test recyclability against real domestic infrastructure 3) Invest in verified, transparent end-of-life partnerships 4) Quantify trade-offs instead of hiding behind PCR percentages • True sustainability is not exporting the problem. • It’s reducing it through intentional design. The uncomfortable question for beauty brands: Are you optimizing for marketing optics, or for structural accountability? • Brands that plan to scale, enter retail, or raise capital cannot afford to ignore this. • I work with founders and operators to evaluate packaging risk, tariff exposure, material selection and infrastructure alignment before those risks become expensive mistakes. • If you’re building for long-term viability, this conversation matters • • #beautypackaging #beautyindustry #cosmeticindustry #cosmeticpackaging #sustainablebeauty

Only 10% of the 500,000 tons of flexible film generated annually in California finds a second life in today's end markets. So how do we prove that a scalable, circular system for this material type is actually possible? That’s the central question a new coalition of brands is seeking to answer. The recently launched U.S. Flexible Film Initiative (USFFI) goes beyond traditional grant funding for new equipment, which is often a one-time capital expense. Instead, they are directly addressing the "operational costs" that have long made flexible film an unattractive material for many recyclers. Member brands include General Mills, Mars, Mondelēz International, Nestlé, Hill's Pet Nutrition and PepsiCo. By offering multi-year contracts, they are helping to: 🟢 De-risk investment for MRFs and reclaimers by guaranteeing a revenue stream. 🟢 Create a consistent supply chain for flexible film bales, encouraging downstream market development. 🟢 Prove out a scalable model that could be replicated in other states with emerging EPR programs. We often talk about the circular economy in a grand, theoretical sense, but the reality is that its success hinges on solving very granular, unglamorous problems. --> How do you convince a facility to take on a low-value, difficult-to-sort material? --> How do you build a business case for a product that has no reliable buyer? The answer is by intentionally building the economic incentives, not just hoping they emerge. The USFFI’s work is a proactive, market-driven effort to change the status quo. It's a prime example of strategic sustainability in action—leveraging collective industry capital to solve a systemic challenge and build a new, circular market. This kind of pre-competitive collaboration is vital. Read more here: https://lnkd.in/gXCdKgdS #EPR #CircularEconomy #SustainablePackaging #WasteManagement #FlexiblePackaging

I read a BBC article about how AI-powered robots are being introduced into recycling facilities to help address a growing challenge facing the sector: waste sorting is becoming increasingly complex, while attracting and retaining workers for these environments remains difficult.   It is interesting to see how AI and innovation are reshaping what is possible in recycling systems and the speed at which technology is evolving. Advanced technologies are helping accelerate the transition to a circular economy for plastic, particularly by improving how we sort and recover materials. And this is probably just the beginning.   One example is flexible plastics – one of the most widely used yet hardest-to-recycle packaging formats. Because they are often lightweight, multi-layered, and difficult to distinguish within mixed waste streams, accurate sorting is especially important. Recycling flexible plastics also requires highly consistent, high-quality feedstock, where even small impurities can impact production or performance. Advanced sorting technologies therefore have significant potential to improve recovery rates, recyclate quality, and ultimately, the viability of recycling flexible plastics at scale.   For years, near-infrared (NIR) technology has been the industry standard for identifying materials in recycling facilities. While effective, it can only detect – rather than quantify – the presence of different polymers or additives, and cannot identify packaging types or access product-level data.   That is where newer technologies such as digital watermarking and AI-based recognition offer real potential.   Digital watermarks embed invisible codes directly into packaging, enabling sorting facilities to identify materials with far greater precision and access detailed product-level information. AI-based recognition systems complement this by identifying packaging through visible characteristics such as shape, colour, and branding, helping improve sorting accuracy even in highly contaminated or complex waste streams.   Importantly, this is no longer theoretical. Through the Alliance’s HolyGrail 2.0 initiative, demonstrations conducted in 2023 and 2024 achieved detection rates of 95% and sorting rates of 85% on the first pass for flexible plastics. Real-world trials are now underway to assess commercial readiness. You can learn more about HolyGrail 2.0 here – https://bit.ly/4nKs4X5.   But innovation alone will not solve this challenge.   Progress depends on collaboration across the ecosystem – bringing together producers, brands, recyclers, governments, funders, and communities to help scale solutions that work. That is where the Alliance focuses its efforts: helping turn promising innovation into system-wide impact that can accelerate the transition to a circular economy for plastic. (Read the BBC article here – https://bbc.in/4wuD27R)   #CircularEconomy #RecyclingInnovation #AI #FlexiblePlastics #DigitalWatermarks #Innovation  

Thrilled to share our latest publication in Nature Communications! Our paper, “Cracking the Code of Multi-Layer Films to Promote Circularity in Single-Use Plastic Packaging,” was led by Levi Hamernik, Ethan Quinn, and Jeffrey Law and tackles one of the most pressing challenges in plastic sustainability: how to design, characterize, and ultimately recycle complex multilayer plastic films that are widely used in packaging but notoriously difficult to reclaim. Here we analyze the key structure-property relationships that drive performance of the polymers used in multi-layer films and how we can use decades of data to develop strong #machinelearning and #AI models to predict new multi-layer film designs that are intrinsically more recyclable. This work aligns with broader efforts to rethink plastic design for sustainability, emphasizing innovation not just at the end of life but throughout the material lifecycle. Read the full article open access on Nature Communications: https://rdcu.be/e28I5 #sustainability #circulareconomy #plastics #chemicalrecycling #materialsengineering #research