US plastic bottle recycling rate increased 3.3% in 2014

ALBANY (Scrap Monster): The latest report published jointly by the Association of Plastic Recyclers (APR) and the American Chemistry Council (ACC) indicates that plastic bottle recycling in the US increased by 3.3% in 2014. The yearly recycling rate topped 31.8% in 2014. The recycling of plastic bottles has increased by 97 million pounds during the year.

According to the report titled “National Post-Consumer Plastics Bottle Recycling Report”, single stream recycling has expanded during the year. The consumption of plastic bottles in packaging applications has increased significantly, however lightweight bottles continue to pose big threat. The lack of adequate number of near-to-home recycling facilities has hampered increased collection rates.

The collection of No.2 (HDPE) plastics surged higher by more than 62 million pounds to 1.1 billion pounds in 2014, in comparison with the previous year. The recycling rate of this category of plastics stood at 33.6%. Nearly 951 million pounds of the collected HDPE were processed by domestic reclaimers. The reclamation levels touched record highs during the year. The balance of 218 million pounds was exported. The percentage of exports of HDPE rose sharply from 15.6% in 2013 to 19.7% in 2014.

The collection of No.5 (PP) plastics has increased sharply by 28.3% over the previous year to 79.5 million pounds in 2014. Out of this, 65.3 million pounds were processed domestically. Also, PP bottles deliberately recycled as PP rose from 44.2 million pounds in 2013 to 45.6 million pounds in 2014.

The report is based on a survey conducted among reclaimers by California-based Moore Recycling Associates Inc.