If Australians haven't noticed the changes being made to how, when, and where they recycle plastic, they will in the coming months.
Strict rules governing the export of plastics, amounting to a virtual ban, came into effect on July 1 last year, and further conditions will be placed on exported plastic from the start of the 2022–23 financial year.
Currently, waste plastic can only be exported if it is sorted into single resin or polymer type, or processed with other materials into processed engineered fuel.
From July 1, 2022, only waste plastics that have been sorted into single resin or polymer type and further processed, for example flaked or pelletised, or processed with other materials into processed engineered fuel can be exported.
Waste companies also need a licence to export and the Department of Environment has confirmed 48 have been approved.
The regulations were designed to kickstart Australia's domestic plastic recycling infrastructure to ensure 70 per cent of plastic waste was either recycled or composted by 2025.
This year's federal budget kicked in an extra $60.4 million to the Recycling Modernisation Fund (RMF) bringing the federal government's investment to $250 million.
The $1 billion RMF includes cash from industry and state governments and will help with new technology and infrastructure to allow hard-to-recycle plastics such as bread bags, takeaway food containers, and plastic wraps to be fully re-manufactured in Australia.
The fund's Remade in Australia campaign points out how the material can be used.
In addition, the nation's largest PET recycling plant, capable of processing one billion plastic bottles each year, opened in Albury last month.
National Waste and Recycling Industry Council CEO Rose Read said these and other initiatives had been in the pipeline for years and now they pointed to significant change for consumers.
Queensland a slow mover
Ms Read said more investment was still needed and singled out Queensland as a slow mover on reform.
She said Queensland had only committed funds to the RMF late last year, and had called for projects but had not yet formally backed any.
With the state government still largely subsidising council waste to landfill in Queensland, Ms Read said significant change was yet to be noticed in the state.
"They've only had a landfill levy for a little while and councils haven't been paying for disposal to landfill. They're winding that back but they have to accelerate it."
Once charges to council increased, Ms Read said residents would face stricter rules around what they placed in their rubbish bins.
More action needed
Australian Packaging Covenant Organisation CEO Brooke Donnelly said just 16 per cent of plastic packaging was successfully recovered in 2019–20.
"Australia will need to make significant changes to successfully reach our plastic recovery target [either recycled or composted] of 70 per cent [by 2025]," she said.
"In the past three years, Australia has seen significant investment from government and industry to improve our recycling infrastructure and technologies and increase Australia's recycling capacity.
"This investment means Australia is now projected to increase its domestic capacity for plastic reprocessing from around 227,000 tonnes in 2020–21 to at least 420,000 tonnes by 2025."
Ms Donnelly said work was also needed at the design stage of plastic.
She said 14 per cent of total packaging was still being designed in a way that could not be recycled, reused, or composted in Australia's recovery system.
Ms Read agreed and said while the government regulations were starting to put pressure on the market, Australia did not yet have enough facilities for all the plastic it needed to process.
She said building plants to process low-density polyethylene (LDPE) plastic — the plastic targeted via the government's RMF — was "quite challenging".
Ms Read also warned while the federal government had consulted with business on the issues surrounding plastic waste exports, there were many flaws in the policy.
"You end up [adding] all this extra cost to process then export it because you can't process it here, but you can't compete.
"Ideally, you'd want to export it raw but we can't and overseas countries are able to sell their [high-density polyethylene] product at lower prices."
However, a Department of Environment spokesperson said businesses had known about the changes since March 2020 and "many businesses will be well placed to meet the new requirements".
"The banning on July 1, 2021 of the export mixed plastic waste, which was often poorly sorted and contaminated, is an important milestone for Australia in taking responsibility for our waste," the spokesperson said.
Collecting the raw material
Collecting the soft plastics that had previously ended up in landfill required a national approach and REDcycle was an early mover in the market, placing recycling bins in Melbourne shopping centres in 2011.
Now, there are bins in more than 1,900 Coles and Woolworths stores across the country.
REDcycle collects 4 million pieces of soft plastic per day and founder Liz Kasell said there was a 200 per cent increase in volume collected during the 2020–2021 financial year.
She said while there was no way to determine how many Australians were engaged with the business, the amount of soft plastic recovered was "increasing exponentially year on year".
"Further, with more brands coming on board to ensure their packaging is indeed able to be REDcycled [over 200 and counting], even more Australians are being alerted to the fact that their favourite brands support REDcycle and are taking responsibility for the end-of-life of their packaging."
REDcycle sends plastic to manufacturers to turn the material into items such as indoor and outdoor furniture, bollards, concrete alternative PolyRok, signage, an asphalt additive for road infrastructure known as Tonerplas, as well as mini wheel stops, and air conditioner mounting blocks.
Ms Kasell said ensuring consumers knew how "creating a robust market for products made from recycled materials" contributed to a "true circular economy" was critical for the country's shift to domestic recycling to succeed.
"Otherwise 'recycling' — of all materials — is a linear model, not circular," she said.
"The Remade in Australia campaign is a really important part of sharing this message."
