EPS industry works to avoid status as ‘problematic' at treaty talks

Nairobi, Kenya — The expanded polystyrene industry has significantly increased its presence at the global plastics treaty talks, partly out of a fear that EPS packaging will be put on a list of materials deemed problematic or that should be phased out.

"There is a concern that we will wind up with an agreement that is going to be problematic for expanded polystyrene, and it's not going to help us promote our circularity and to bump that up, and will come with unintended consequences," said Walter Reiter, director of advocacy and regulatory affairs for the EPS Industry Association in the U.S., in a Nov. 15 interview from the talks in Kenya.

EPS industry representatives said they brought more people to the current round of talks being held at United Nations offices in Nairobi, from Nov. 13-19, while working to form closer ties globally.

EPS associations and companies from around the world brought about a dozen representatives to the talks, compared with only a few people at the previous negotiating session in Paris, in late May and early June.

As well, EPS business groups from Europe, the United States, Australia and South Africa formed the Global EPS Sustainability Alliance ahead of the Kenya meeting, the third of five planned negotiating sessions for what's called the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee on the treaty, or INC 3.

"We're all facing the same challenges, so it's an opportunity to share information amongst ourselves, and it increases our horsepower, frankly," Reiter said. "It really came together for INC 3."

Diplomats from 170 countries and hundreds of observers from industry, environmental groups and others came to the talks in Kenya.

Among them was Todd Huempfner, EPS-IA chairman from 2018 to 2023 and north sales manager at Atlas Molded Products Inc., a large maker of EPS insulation and packaging that's part of Atlanta-based Atlas Roofing Corp.

He said another concern for the EPS industry is an emphasis in treaty discussions on chemical health issues, including elevating concerns about potential human health and environmental effects from additives used in plastic products.

"Coming into this, we felt like this was a plastics pollution bill," Huempfner said. "But the conversations that are getting had right now, amongst delegates and between the NGOs, seems to be leaning more towards human health."

He said the associations are concerned about draft language in the treaty around restricting or capping plastic production.

Supporters of that idea say it's necessary because current volumes of plastic waste can't be effectively controlled, but Heumpfner said it could reduce availability of materials for home insulation and energy-saving applications.

"[Caps are] also misplaced," he said. "We won't support that, when you look at what it does to our building and construction side. Those are long-term applications that we're putting those materials into, for thermal efficiency for reducing energy consumption over time."

The EPS groups said they want to elevate discussions of those benefits at the treaty talks and raise awareness of what they say, in North America, has been $185 million in industry investments to boost recycled content.

EPS-IA announced a Nov. 6 statement timed to the talks that, over time, those investments will boost recycled content in EPS protective packaging to 30 percent.

For now, though, the figures are in the single digit percent. Heumpfner said by the end of 2024 the industry will have 10 million pounds of recycled content available.

That amounts to about 5 percent of the 200 million to 250 million pounds of EPS resin used in protective packaging annually in North America, he said.

The industry plans to scale that up to increase capacity of post-consumer recycled resin, which would need to grow dramatically to 60 million to 80 million pounds of recycled resin capacity, he said.

"Much of the $185 million investment that we're talking about are coming for the PCR [post-consumer] resin," Heumpfner said.

Many countries in public statements at the talks said they wanted any agreement to include lists of materials deemed problematic, as well as to have the pact look at chemicals of concern.

While none of the national statements spelled out which materials should be labeled problematic, with that work coming in later sessions, a U.N. science report prepared for treaty diplomats within the last year said EPS and polystyrene packaging could be put in lists of so-called "problematic" plastics and noted they were not recycled "in practice and at scale."

Other nongovernmental parties in the talks have pointed to problems recycling EPS packaging and have advocated for it to be put on those restricted lists.

Environmental Protection Agency figures show about 6 percent of PS packaging is recycled in the U.S. from households, although that figure includes more than EPS packaging.

EPS officials, however, argue that EPS used in transport packaging, including insulated and protective packaging, have recycling rates of at least 30 percent in North America, Europe and parts of Asia.

The increase in EPS industry participation at the talks mirrors that of the larger chemical industry, according to an analysis released during the Kenya talks by the Center for International Environmental law.

It said, based on an analysis of attendance lists at the talks, that fossil fuel and chemical industry representatives increased 36 percent, to more than 140, compared with the previous negotiation session in Paris in May.

CIEL said it wanted the treaty to enact stronger conflict of interest provisions to prevent the agreement from becoming a "fossil-fueled treaty."