Plastics Industry Association names 2021 Re|focus Sustainability Innovation winners
The Plastics Industry Association (Plastics), Washington, has announced winners of the 2021 Re|focus Sustainability Innovation Awards. The awards recognize companies that are “driving environmental advances in product design, sustainable materials and end-of-life recovery of plastics.”
Garçon Wines is the winner of the Design award for addressing the large carbon footprint of round, glass wine bottles with a beautifully designed space-, weight- and energy-saving flat bottle made entirely from recycled polyethylene terephthalate (rPET) plastic, the association says.
Ford Motor Co. is the recipient of the Materials award for a composite incorporating biomaterial from coffee manufacturing. The composite is 17 percent lighter, requires 25 percent less energy to produce and is more sustainable than the talc-filled material that was its predecessor.
Digimarc Corp. has received the End-of-Life award for its digital watermarking solution, giving plastics and other scrap material a “digital recycling passport” to increase the accuracy and efficiency of the recycling process and drive a more circular economy.
The association also has announced the winners of the Re|focus Leadership and People’s Choice awards.
Chevron Phillips Chemical has received the Leadership Award for converting difficult-to-recycle plastic scrap into top-quality raw materials.
“Receiving the 2021 Re|focus Sustainability Leadership Innovation Award underscores our commitment to advance a circular economy for plastics,” says Benny Mermans, vice president of sustainability at Chevron Phillips Chemical. “Through Marlex Anew Circular Polyethylene and our expanding efforts to create sustainable streams for waste plastics, Chevron Phillips Chemical is well-positioned to deliver sustainable solutions for years to come.”
Fort Otosan received the People’s Choice Award for an automotive fan shroud that is produced with 50 percent recycled material and that reduces the CO2 produced in the manufacturing process.
“Since we started on the project in 2019 to develop a part that provides the same performance level by using recycled material instead of the conventional fan shroud part made of only raw plastic, we have successfully decreased carbon emissions related to production and achieved a 17 percent cost savings with a 2.2-kilogram carbon footprint reduction per piece,” says Özak Durmuş, Ford Otosan sustainability senior engineer. “This is a very significant step toward increasing the demand for recycled plastics and creating a circular economy structure in Turkey.”
“We had a record-setting year of 52 entries for the 2021 awards and 3,080 votes cast for our People’s Choice Award,” says Patrick Krieger, senior director of materials and sustainability for Plastics. “The applications are incredibly diverse, showing how sustainability is being incorporated into plastics.”
Plastics says nominations for the 2022 Plastics Re|focus Sustainability Innovation Awards will start in November of this year.