Plastics Recycling Update Magazine: NewsBits from Plastics Recycling Update

NewsBits

September 10, 2015

By 2017, consumption of bottled water in the U.S. is expected to outpace purchases of soda, which is decreasing in popularity, according to The Wall Street Journal. U.S. bottled water volume increased 7 percent last year, putting it on track to exceed that of soda in the next couple of years. Nestle SA, which recently unveiled a 100 percent recycled content water bottle, sold more water than Dr Pepper Snapple Group sold soda last year.

Safeway stores in Clark County, Wash. have partnered to supply Trex with post-consumer polyethylene films, according to The Columbian newspaper. Twelve Safeway stores in the area will collect film to be later baled and sent to Trex's manufacturing facility in Nevada. It takes roughly 2,250 bags to make a standard 16-foot composite lumber board, the newspaper reports.

The Minnesota Pollution Control Agency has unveiled a 25-foot-tall "bagnado," a collection of plastic bags in the shape of a tornado, to raise awareness of plastic bag pollution, according to the Star Tribune. The bagnado was on display at the Minnesota State Fair in St. Paul.

An alliance of westbound ocean-freight lines has announced it will try to push up rates for shipping recyclable material from North America to Asia. The 15 large shipping lines in the Transpacific Stabilization Agreement system say they’ll move rates upward in October from the current at-cost or below-cost levels. Additional rates increases are recommended for November and December.

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