Miljøparametre til miljøindeks for emballageafgifter

English Summary

The aim of this project is to develop environmental profiles for packaging materials for retail use. It is the intention, that the environmental profiles shall be used to introduce environmental aspects when defining the taxes on packaging materials. The introduction of environmental aspects in taxes shall stimulate the producers to select materials with less environmental impact.

A new tax on packaging materials for retail use was introduced 1 January 1999 in Denamrk. The intention is to decrease the amount of material used for packaging and by this reduces the environmental impact. This tax was only weight based and did not include the type of packaging or the environmental impact.

In this project, a methodology to calculate environmental profiles is developed for the following packaging materials:

• Cardboard/paper
• Glass
• HDPE-, LDPE-, PP-, EPS-, PET-, PVC- and PS plastics
• Tinplate/steel
• Aluminium

The environmental profiles are developed for the parameters primary energy, CO₂ emission, environmental effects, use of the resources (coal, oil and natural gas) and waste generation. The Danish EDIP methodology (Environmental Development of Industrial Products) is used for lifecycle screenings to develop the profiles.

A number of scenarios for different materials used for packaging are described. When defining the scenarios it is assumed that the packaging is either based on primary materials or on secondary materials. It is also assumed that the final disposal of the packaging material is either a combustion method or partly combustion and partly recycling, resulting in a total of 4 scenarios for each material, except glass and aluminium, where only 2 scenarios are presented. The functional unit covers 1 kg of packaging in the lifecycle screening.

The calculation of profiles for plastic packaging is based on an average energy use at the production stage for any shape or type of plastic packaging. The number of possible errors is tested in further detailed calculations, which show that the resulting profiles do not differ significantly due to the use of average energy consumption in the calculations. The calculations assume that the combustion of the materials at the disposal stage results in an energy recovery, which will be credited the environmental profile.

It is believed that the methodology and the environmental profiles based on the results can present an overview of the environmental impact for the different packaging materials. The environmental profile is to be considered as a tool for dividing the packaging materials into different levels of environmental impact.

Studying the different packaging materials and their environmental profiles makes it possible to suggest a ranking of the materials. Cardboard/paper shows the lowest environmental impact per kg packaging followed by the plastic packaging. However, EPS and PVC disposed by combustion, show a significantly higher environmental impact. EPS, PVC and Aluminium disposed by combustion represents the highest environmental impact at all per kg packaging.

Tinplate/steel packaging represents a high environmental impact related to waste generation, due to a high amount of hazardous waste produced. For all other parameters, steel is comparable to the plastics.

The recycling of PVC, EPS and Aluminium - and to some extent steel - results in lower environmental impact than the combustion of the materials. However, it should be mentioned that recycling of PVC packaging is not possible at this point in time.

In this study, all the environmental profiles for the different packaging materials seem to be related to the energy consumption.