Vinyl industry talks benefits, fights restrictions at treaty talks

Nairobi, Kenya — The vinyl industry delegation to the plastics treaty negotiations is bringing a two-pronged approach as diplomats start to hammer out details: talk about the benefits of PVC while pushing back on calls for restrictions on the material.

As countries at the current round of negotiations, which opened Nov. 13 at United Nations' offices in Kenya, begin a year-long process to write a treaty text, vinyl industry groups were on hand to argue for PVC's role in society.

"Our fundamental purpose here is to educate, to talk to people about the quality PVC products in health care that are saving lives with the blood bags that we have, or providing clean tap water in communities that need clean and safe drinking water," said Ned Monroe, president and CEO of the Washington-based Vinyl Institute and current chair of the Global Vinyl Council.

"We're here as a resource to answer the questions about what our products do to improve health care, to have a lower carbon footprint, to protect products and public health. We're hoping we're seen as a resource."

Monroe spoke in a Nov. 12 interview in Nairobi, where he was attending talks with five other other representatives of vinyl trade groups worldwide.

The negotiations will run through Nov. 19, with diplomats from 170 countries and hundreds of observers from industry, environmental groups and other organizations. It's the third of five negotiation rounds planned, with two more scheduled in 2024.

It's still early in the talks to predict details about how an agreement would address specific plastics or applications, but countries are debating in general terms whether it should put some limits on plastic production or include phase-out lists of "problematic" plastic applications or chemicals of concern within plastics.

PVC has shown up on some lists of problematic materials for packaging put together groups like the Ellen MacArthur Foundation.

Some countries have made strong comments in public sessions in Nairobi that they want the treaty to include such lists and also to look closely at chemicals and additives in plastic and potential health risks from them.

At this point, however, nations haven't said publicly what should be on any lists.

Monroe said vinyl industry officials are telling countries and others they're meeting that banning or restricting PVC or its building blocks would make it harder to meet the U.N.'s official Sustainable Development Goals.

"PVC has a really unique ability to bring clean, safe tap water to communities that need it, and if you were to have a ban, or restriction on PVC, it would create inequities," Monroe said. "And it would be impossible to reach the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals."

"We would be concerned on any ultimate agreement that would have any reduction in PVC or our ingredients," he said. "When we talk to folks, we're raising the issue proactively with governments to talk about the inequities that are created if you were to ban PVC."

In the United States, the Environmental Protection Agency is considering an action that could potentially limit vinyl chloride monomer.

EPA is reviewing whether to put VCM, a key PVC building block, through a health risk evaluation under the Toxics Substances Control Act.

It's promised a decision by the end of the year. Monroe said VI is confident VCM would be shown to be safe in any EPA review.

Despite the debates over production limits and problematic lists, Monroe said he sees three areas of potential consensus emerging at the talks, including over having much more public information available about the additives or chemicals in plastics.

"Ingredient transparency is something I think that the industry is looking at very seriously," he said. On areas of consensus, Monroe said he was speaking for VI but not for the GVC.

Monroe also sees interest among industry, government and environmental organizations around common design for recycling standards, and for establishing chemical management systems like TSCA more widely.

"If there are areas of the world that currently don't have effective chemical management schemes, that might be an area where at least the Vinyl Institute and our members are interested in trying to make sure that we have responsible management of chemicals," he said. "That's an area in the treaty that we might be able to get some consensus on."

Monroe said the vinyl industry generally wants the treaty to focus on reducing plastics in the environment, a narrower scope compared to calls from some in the treaty debate for a broader focus.

"It's very early in the process, but a concern is the scope, and the scope is still being debated," he said. "We're going to defend every aspect of the PVC supply chain. Every one of our products, whether it's its packaging, or water pipes, or blood bags."

"We're going defend every single aspect," he said. "And so if the scope is narrow, and is just dealing with litter, if it's just dealing with plastic leakage, and plastic packaging, we will still be at the table."

"But as you know, 75 percent, 80 percent of our products are long lasting, durable products," he said. "They're not ending up in the litter."

Monroe said vinyl officials are talking to diplomats about how PVC is used, and pointing out that 70 percent goes into durable products like pipes or flooring, rather than single-use packaging that can quickly leak into the environment and attracts much of the treaty's attention.

He said about 4 percent of vinyl is used in packaging, and sometimes that's in specialized applications like blister packs for drugs, where vinyl meets performance requirements.

As well, he said the industry is talking about PVC's role in light-weighting vehicles and how PVC can preserve blood for 42 days: "No other product can do that."