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Plastics Unwrapped
Plastics Unwrapped

Plastics Unwrapped

Plastics Unwrapped is a podcast series by Dow, featuring a range of expert guests exploring some of the biggest questions facing the plastics industry right now. Across several bite-sized episodes, we open up the conversation and explore the world of sustainability and plastics.

Available Episodes 10

A sustainable future requires the creation of a circular economy for plastic, and we must build systems with decarbonisation at the core.

In Episode #4 of Plastics Unwrapped, we explored how advanced recycling technologies will play a key role in accelerating a circular economy for plastic. In this episode, we take it a step further and address how this process can help us decarbonise operations. We sat down with Oliver Borek from Mura, a world leader in advanced recycling technology, Virginia Janssens, the Managing Director for Plastics Europe, and Marc van den Biggelaar, Sustainability Director at Dow, to discuss what’s needed to create a circular economy for plastics, how we're scaling advanced recycling, and considerations for how the industry can reach net zero.

While the industry agrees that there’s a need to decarbonize plastics, is a comparison to coal fair? In this episode, Dow’s Carolina Gregorio is in discussion with David Carroll of Plastics Europe and David Croft of Racket as they explore the journey the plastics industry needs to take to reach net zero emissions, and how the smallest of shifts in consumer behaviour can drastically decrease the amount of virgin plastics needed to make packaging. 

Key discussion points:

  1. Discussion of the learnings from the Reshaping Plastics study. (08:00)
  2. Dow’s investment in decarbonization and reaching net zero (17:22)
  3. The drive from consumers for more recyclable products and plastic recycling schemes (23:00)

This episode explores the challenges faced by Africa’s informal waste sector, with a focus on the partnerships helping to improve the continent’s plastics value chain to enable the scaling of advanced recycling solutions. Adwoa Coleman is joined by Vivien Luk, Executive Director of non-profit organization WORK, and Cordie Aziz-Nash, founder of Environment 360, for this thought-provoking discussion. The panel touch on the effects of COVID-19 on plastics processing chains in Africa and describe the changes needed to transform the continent’s informal waste sector. 

Key discussion points: 

  • Defining what climate justice means (07:47)
  • The challenges faced by Africa’s plastics value chain (12:24)
  • The role of the private sector in implementing change (28:08)

This episode explores the role of design in enabling a circular economy for plastics, by delving into the challenges and opportunities of scaling designing for recycling solutions. Julie Zaniewski is joined in this conversation by Jay Fitzgerald from the US Department of Energy and Kathleen Liang from North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University. The panel discusses the role of individual businesses in advancing plastics recycling and set out their own company goals, including objectives for improving waste management, reducing greenhouse gases, and increasing the recyclability of products. 

Key discussion points: 

  • Dow’s commitment to ensuring all products sold into packaging applications will be recyclable by 2035 (04:00)
  • The Department of Energy’s 2030 goals on energy saving, end of life solutions, and the reduction of greenhouse gases (29:10)
  • US businesses focus on waste management (28:45)

This episode delves into the need to reduce CO2 emissions in the plastics industry and how Dow is working towards producing circular plastics with a lower CO2 footprint. Marco Ten Bruggencate is joined by Howard Chase and Erika Sánchez Garrido, from Dow, and Kaj Embren, a sustainable development expert. They discuss why the decade between 2020 to 2030 is crucial in terms climate protection and how ‘The Greta effect’ has caused public consciousness around CO2 levels to grow, sparking a rise in demand for industry action. 

Key discussion points include: 

  1. Dow's partnership with Shell to transform furnaces and electrify energy (07:04-07:30)
  2. How The EU Green deal is encouraging and enabling innovation (10:36-11:02)
  3. The need for education to meet the low carbon economy goals (27:44 – 28:11)

In this episode, Dow’s Director of EU Affairs, Dennis Kredler, is joined by Plastic Europe’s Director of External Affairs, David Carroll, to discuss the EU’s Green Deal and what it means for the plastics industry. Dennis and David discuss the content and ambitions of the Green Deal, the opportunities and challenges it presents for the plastic industry and what actions organisations such as Dow are taking to ensure they meet the Green Deal’s goal of circularity and climate neutrality by 2050.

Tune in to Episode 5 of Plastics Unwrapped to hear an open discussion on the opportunities and challenges we face with plastic waste in Africa and an exploration into how key collaborations are shifting the dial on collecting, sorting and recycling rates to build an effective circular economy. Adwoa Coleman, Africa Sustainability & Advocacy Manager from Dow’s Plastics business, joins Arese Lucia Onaghise, Executive Secretary at The Food and Beverage Recycling Alliance (FBRA) and Keiran Smith, CEO and Co-Founder of recycling company, Mr. Green Africa, to talk about the landscape for plastics on the continent.

In this episode, Carsten Larsen, Dow’s Commercial Director for Recycling in EMEA & APAC is  joined by Iain Gulland, CEO of Zero Waste Scotland, and Sirt Mellema, CEO of Fuenix Ecogy Group, to discuss ‘game-changing’ advanced recycling technology. 

Advanced recycling takes hard-to-recycle, mixed plastic waste and breaks it down into its basic chemical elements – allowing waste to become infinitely recyclable. The panel look at what this technology means for both industry and consumers.

Key discussion points include:

  1. What is advanced or feedstock recycling ?
  2. How to recycle plastics that were previously unrecyclable.
  3. Advanced recycling in a circular economy.

Why is it so difficult to recycle plastics? What is the difference between recyclable and recycled? Why do recycling rates change so drastically from country to country and even street to street? Dow's Romain Cazenave, Marketing Director for Packaging & Specialty Plastics in EMEA, and Karin Katzer, Marketing Director in EMEA, shed light on this topic and explain how plastic manufacturers can create products that are easier to recycle as well as support recycling systems. They are joined by Krzysztof Krajewski, Director of Packaging Sustainability at RB, one of the world’s largest consumer goods companies.

Key discussion points include:

  1. Why recycling rates differ from so much between areas
  2. The role of plastics manufacturers in creating products that are easier to recycle, as well as supporting recycling.

Dow's Thomas Reutter, Product Director for Packaging & Specialty Plastics in EMEA, and Panu Routasalo, Vice President at UPM Biofuels, talk about market growth for renewable feedstocks and how this fits with the industry’s plans to reduce its carbon emissions. They discuss why approaches like mass balance are important in supporting market growth for bioplastics, as well as the industry's role in ensuring the growth of renewable feedstocks and the need to continue working together with others to find more sustainable solutions.

Key discussion points include: 

  1. What are renewable feedstocks?
  2. Potential challenges of feedstocks as an industry solution (8:28 - 8:47)