Coloured vs Clear PET

Objective Background
Present the facts on how coloured PET bottle (such as Sprite green bottle As part of the World Without Waste
or L&P brown bottles) impact the recycling and value chain. to understand recyclability of all our
Impact on Recycling packaging materials, it has been
• Coloured PET reduce recycling rate of high value transparent PET identified that coloured bottle poses a
- During sorting and rejecting process, for every one of the coloured PET, one clear PET is problem in our local markets.
also rejected  reducing rate of recycling on High Value PET Also, there is an increasing “shift”
- Having coloured PET in recycling stream also prevents high recycling rates of full shrink
globally to move coloured bottler such
sleeve bottles as the sorting is by colour instead of by material
as green bottle (Sprite) to clear bottle.
• Does not promote Circular Economy
- Coloured PET are downcycled to black fibres or outdoor furniture. It will not turn This document compiles all the
into recycled plastic (see also business impact) technical facts and trends in other BUs
• In Aus: coloured PET are exported to Asia. There is a risk of the port closing and to inform business the impact and
not accepting this PET. Worst case scenario: landfill or marine pollution risks to our value chain including our
• Note: Light blue tinge (i.e. in Mt Franklin Light sparkling) is the only colour buy back schemes in Fiji and what are
acceptable in the rPET industry as it improves the clear PET appearance (looks current practises of MRFs (Material
more glass like) Recovery Facilities) – whom role is to
recover and sort the materials post-
Impact on Value Chain & Business consumer use.
Post-consumer value of coloured/Mixed PET bale is significantly lower
compared to clear PET:
• In Aus: VISY is currently paying recyclers in Asia to take it away => negative value
• In Fiji: Mission Pacific receive <50 % of the price/kg on green PET vs clear PET bale
- This impacts the funding of Mission Pacific as the business is paying FJ $1/kg of PET (regardless of colour type),
but lose money on the green PET bottle when selling the PET bale.

Current regulations or industry actions

-APCO (Australian Packaging Covenant) technical advisory committee is currently working to differentiate coloured polymer on
their recyclability study, to call out its low recoverable value.
We are currently monitoring this – in case they call out for specific actions to move to transparent PET only in the industry

What are other BUs doing?

-Countries that ban coloured PET: Japan, South Korea (in 2018)
-Other BUs such as ASEAN has also planned to move to clear PET
-In some part of WEBU and Latin America (Mexico, Brazil) for example: local market has enough volume of coloured PET in the
market and collection infrastructure to create a circular economy for bottle-to-bottle (B2B) for e.g. back to green PET again.
Also, some parts of WEBU, the plan is to keep status quo of light green PET in
Sprite which is downcycled to straps etc and not B2B
)
Recommendation
• Stop introducing new product with coloured PET into our portfolio
• Work with Marketing team to assess the potential to derive a
transition plan to Clear PET for Sprite and L&P
• Potentially using this change to demonstrate industry leadership in
Aus and NZ; and as a corporate narrative to showcase our
commitment to World Without Waste
Example in Japan
Classified - Confidential Prepared By: Lynn Hong Release Date: 07-09-2018