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Navigating the Compostable Packaging Landscape: Insights from BPI Executive Director Rhodes Yepsen

Which applications are best for compostable packaging? How can labeling help eliminate consumer confusion over proper disposal? What role will EPR play in facilitating composting? BPI Executive Director Rhodes Yepsen shares his thoughts.

Compostable Packaging
Rhodes Yepsen, Executive Director, Biodegradable Products Institute

With recent industry reports indicating compostable packaging is poised to grow at double-digit rates over the next decade and in light of a new report from the Biodegradable Products Institute and the Closed Loop Partners Composting Consortium  bringing to light the considerable consumer challenges related to composting, Packaging World sat down with BPI Executive Director Rhodes Yepsen to learn how the association is guiding the industry forward.

Packaging World:

You probably get this question ad nauseum, but in order to level set, could you define biodegradable, compostable, and bio-based and explain how these characteristics sometimes overlap and how they differ?

Rhodes Yepsen:

Sure. So really these terms describe either the front of life or the end of life of products and materials. And as you indicated, sometimes they can have both of these attributes, and sometimes they are distinct. So starting with bio-based, bio-based refers to the origin of the raw material, meaning it was made with renewable feedstocks. This does not dictate whether the item is biodegradable, compostable, or even recyclable. Biodegradability and compostability, on the other hand, refer to the ability of the product or material to be processed through a biological pathway. Compostability is a specific environment, instead of conditions, in which biodegradation can occur. Composting is a controlled process and is one that we talk about a lot because that’s where we have a parallel to end of life with something like recycling, with organized collection and processing.

Compostable PackagingChart courtesy of Closed Loop Partners’ Composting Consortium

Biodegradation can also happen in uncontrolled environments if a product is leaked into the environment where there’s going to be a lot more variability in the rate of biodegradation. Because of that variability, because it’s not controlled, and we don’t want products leaking into the environment, that’s why you see laws popping up around the U.S., Canada, and Europe restricting the term biodegradable, because we don’t want consumers to be confused and think they can litter an item. So yes, it’s really the front-of-life benefits, whether the item was made with a renewable feedstock or not, and then on the other side, the end of life, which, along with compostability or biodegradability, also includes recyclability, for instance, or reusability.

What are the main activities of the Biodegradable Products Institute?

We are a member-based association, and our core activities are around certification and claims, marketing and education, and policy. And through those different activities, we’re working to promote the production, use, and appropriate end of life for materials that can break down in these biologically active environments. Today that is primarily composting. That’s where the core of our history has been—working on materials and products, qualifying them for compostability, and making sure they’re designed with factors in mind to get them successfully collected and composted. We work with the raw material producers, the packaging converters, brands, retailers, municipalities, haulers, composters—everyone in the value chain is represented in our membership and our board of directors.

When it comes to policy, are you a lobbying group, or do you just report on policy for your members?

We do both. So we are a 501(c)(6) association, which allows us more latitude to be directly engaged in policy work than a 501(c)(3). Part of that involves informing members of things that are going on, with bill tracking and updates and status on things. But then we’re also engaged with amendments and meetings and direct outreach to influence policy. A lot of that is focused on the success of compostability claims, the things that are reinforced in our other work around labeling and standards, making sure claims are based on standards, and working on funding for infrastructure and composting. We’re very supportive of things such as extended producer responsibility and are trying to make sure it’s inclusive of composting and not just focused on recycling. That’s been a big focus of ours—making sure that as policies evolve, they’re not calling for a blind replacement of all plastics with bioplastics on the one hand, but on the other hand, not wanting compostable products to be boxed out in the shadow of the bigger efforts around recycling.

The 2023 Packaging Compass report, from PMMI – The Association for Packaging and Processing Technologies and AMERIPEN, forecasts that compostable packaging will grow by a CAGR of 15% to 16% by 2027. To what do you attribute this growth?

Last year, McKinsey did a survey of countries around the world and looked at the most sustainable attributes in consumers’ minds for packaging. Compostability was at the top in the majority of countries, followed by things like plant-based. So for sure, companies listen to consumer demands and read those reports as well. But it’s a combination of factors. Consumers want more options. They’re frustrated by all the reports of low recycling rates and the difficulties we’ve collectively had around the world with recycling, and they’re hungry for more options that will work. They’re also concerned about other factors such as chemicals in plastics and products. Certified compostable products don’t include things like PFAS with forever chemical

Compostable packagingImage courtesy of PMMI and AMERIPEN from the "2024 Packaging Compass" report
A lot of it is also being driven by corporate commitments and policy. Companies are making public commitments to do better in the face of the difficulties with packaging, and they’re setting targets to have all of their packaging be reusable, recyclable, or compostable. Similarly, policies around the world are trying to figure out where to reduce unnecessary packaging and how to collectively design packaging for recovery in a better way. For things like non-recyclable food-contact packaging, compostability has a great value proposition.

So I think it’s a combination of those things: Consumers being frustrated with the current options with things they’re getting off the shelf, companies wanting to do better and making these public commitments, and then policies tying that all up and saying, “Well, we’re going to hold you to it.”

Despite the fact that compostable packaging is set to grow at such a rapid pace, it’s not the best packaging material for every application. From what I understand, foodservice packaging is one of the best uses because it delivers the nitrogen-rich food waste that composters need for their compost products. Does BPI consider the packaging application when certifying a compostable product?

That’s a great question and one that BPI has really taken a firm stance on over the years. So unlike some certifiers that are just certifying to a scientific standard, which is the core requirement, the tests that go into things to make sure they will successfully compost, not create microplastics, not be toxic to plants in the soil, all of those are also in our certification. But we’ve added in these other layers to get help companies decide whether compostability is the right pathway for their item, rather than just saying, “Oh, well, consumers just want it to magically disappear.” That’s not how composting works. It’s not magic. It doesn’t disappear. And so we built in other criteria to our certification years ago that said, you have to pass these other criteria or design of the end applications.

Once we get to that finished package phase when somebody’s applying, they have to demonstrate that the product will be associated with desirable feedstocks that a composter is accepting. So making sure that the package is designed for the circular economy and the systems that will go to composting or anaerobic digestion. It can’t be a better fit for recycling, which is a difficult one to assess. In the public sector, that means items like beverage bottles, since that’s a really highly desirable recycling stream. And, it can’t require disassembly either, because we don’t want the risk of contamination if somebody isn’t taking the time to actually disassemble the package to get it composted.

It’s that first one that’s probably the hardest threshold to cut through. And what that means is things typically associated with food, so foodservice packaging, to-go items, bags to help people collect food scraps in the kitchen, both at home and in [commercial] kitchens, flexible food packaging, those multilayer packages around a snack bar or chips or other things like that. And then also common contaminants in the compost stream, things like a produce stickers, which are not recyclable, tend not to be pulled off with fruit and go to the composting facility and is a tricky thing to screen out.

Do you discourage the use of compostable packaging for non-food applications for something like an electronics package, for example?

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