On Tuesday 7 November, the European Consumer Organisation (BEUC) and its members in 11 countries (Austria, Spain, France, Finland, Hungary, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal, Slovakia, Slovenia and Switzerland) announced that they had lodged a complaint with the European Commission and the national authorities requesting an investigation into the greenwashing practices of the major distributors of plastic drinks bottles, Coca-Cola HBC, Danone and Nestlé Waters.
The allegations about the recycling of these bottles are vague, inaccurate and/or insufficiently substantiated. The following three practices give cause for concern:
- the claim ‘100% recyclable’, an ambiguous term which, to be true, depends on factors such as the infrastructure available to collect the materials, the efficiency of the sorting process or the appropriate recycling processes. The associations argue that the chances of a PET bottle becoming a bottle again are around 30%.
- the claim ‘100% recycled’, which wrongly assumes that the full bottle is made entirely from recycled materials, when in fact the addition of virgin (i.e. non-recycled) plastic to the body of the bottle is common practice.
- the use of green images such as green logos or images of nature, which give the false impression of environmental neutrality and endless plastic circularity, and may even give the impression that bottles have a positive impact on the environment.
BEUC report: https://aeur.eu/f/9er
Letter to national authorities: https://aeur.eu/f/9es (Original version in French by Aminata Niang)