EU circularity of plastic materials

The EU circularity of plastic materials is the share of secondary plastics produced/recycled in the EU in the overall EU plastic materials consumption. So the metric is linked to the metrics on EU plastics consumption (as a metric for overall EU plastics use).

The strength of metric lies in its combination of both the primary and secondary materials consumption and its decoupling. It indicates whether or not the growth in secondary materials production is compensated by more plastic materials consumption. Increasing the EU circularity of plastic materials — either by increasing the amount of secondary materials production or decreasing the amount of material consumed — will reduce the amount of primary material needed, and the associated negative impacts on the environment and climate. What is missing, compared to the CMUR indicator, is the net EU trade (export – import) of secondary plastics (recycled plastic waste). This information is not readily available. Therefore, the current metric is limited to the share of EU secondary plastic materials production in the total EU plastic use.