SafeCycle - FH Campus Wien

Project Duration: January 2023 until December 2024

With the European Circular Economy Action Plan (CEAP), the EU requires that by 2030, all packaging placed on the market must be recyclable, or made from recycled material. When evaluating recycling processes, the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) assumes that contaminants are to be considered as direct DNA-reactive substances, so-called mutagens. These are toxicologically critical to consumer safety and their presence must be excluded to allow the use of recycled material for food contact (or other high-value applications, such as cosmetic packaging). This is particularly challenging for polyolefins, where very low migration limits apply. The evaluation of recyclates with regard to the presence of critical substances was already started in the predecessor project PolyCycle. There, indications of such pollutants were systematically found in some samples, which probably did not have a post-consumer origin.

Schematische Darstellung des Forschungsprozesses. Recycelte Verpackungen für Nahrung, Kosmetik und Waschmittel werden stichprobenartig untersucht. Je nach Substanz mit Gaschromatographie, Hochleistungsflüssigkeitschromatographie oder Biotests.

PET recycling is already well established compared to the recycling of polyolefins and polystyrene (PS). In particular, the lack of toxicological information on the substances contained in the recycled material is crucial for safety assessment. Consequently, this complicates the use of polyolefins and PS in contact with food. Currently, any unknown substance must be classified as a DNA-reactive mutagen and/or carcinogen. EFSA has classified these substances as of very high concern and is closely monitoring the situation. The PolyCycle project has already shown that these concerns are not unfounded, as about 30% of all polyolefin samples tested gave a positive reaction for DNA-reactive mutagenicity in the in vitro bioassays. These contaminations were found to be systematic, indicating that the substances did not originate from the post-consumer sector, but from the recycling process itself. The responsible step in the recycling process needs to be identified and adjusted accordingly. In addition, the results showed that non-volatile substances have a major impact on mutagenicity. Instrumental-analytical identification of the substances could help in toxicological evaluation.

Project goals and results

As a result of the project, the sources of contamination of recycled plastics with DNA-reactive substances, which can be regularly detected in recycled polyolefins and polystyrenes, will be identified and a catalog of measures with clear recommendations for the prevention and investigation of these contaminations in recycled plastics will be published.