Kickstart: Optimistic in spite of uncertain economy

Plastics News' Nov. 28 print issue featured our annual special report on compounding. It's a keeper because of the listing of compounders — how many readers consulted that when resins were in short supply in 2021-22?

But the real highlight is Frank Esposito's centerpiece feature. He talks with top officials at nearly every major U.S. compounder and concentrates maker.

Here are a few highlights from this year's report:

• First-half demand growth was fairly strong, but inventories began to grow from COVID-shocked purchases just as a slowing global economy caused demand to slow down. That's made for a challenging second half of 2022, although most officials say this was a good year.

• Last year we heard frequently from processors that were having trouble finding certain materials. Compounders are no longer reporting shortages, saying that supply chain issues have eased or disappeared.

• Sustainability is a major focus, and compounders are working to help customers meet recycling goals.

• Looking ahead to 2023, executives are optimistic, in spite of some uncertain economic indicators.

"Everyone is going to see a correction in the fourth quarter [of 2022], but you have to have some optimism," Techmer PM Chairman John Manuck said. "We'll have to wait and see how January looks."

If you buy a Mars, Snickers or Milky Way bar in Australia or New Zealand next year, you may be surprised to see them wrapped in some old-school packaging.

As Jim Johnson reported, Mars Inc. is switching to paper-based packaging for those three chocolate bars in Australia and New Zealand. It took three years to make the switch.

"We wanted to make it easy for our consumers to recycle our products. But it was no mean feat. There was no playbook, no guardrails and no road map, but today, we can sit back and say we've done it," Andrew Leakey, general manager of the company's Mars Wrigley Australia division, said in a LinkedIn post.

"We will be the first chocolate bars in Australia to be wrapped in recyclable paper-based packaging, and the work our team has done in Australia to get us to this point is a world-first for Mars Wrigley," he said.

I'm sure many Plastics News readers will remember when most candy wrappers were paper. Oriented polypropylene has plenty of advantages over paper, but — in Australia at least — recyclability is most important.

This technology may never be commercialized, but it's still pretty amazing. Scientists from the University of Illinois, the University of California Santa Barbara and Dow Inc. have developed a process to transform polyethylene into polypropylene.

The researchers developed a series of coupled catalytic reactions that transform PE into propylene, which can then be used to make polypropylene resin.

The researchers say this is proof that PE can be upcycled into a useful product, which in the process would significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions.