CVWMA Joins U.S. Plastics Pact, Committing to Meet Ambitious Circular Economy Goals By 2025

August 25, 2020 | Published by Nancy Drumheller

August 25, 2020

For Immediate Release

Contact: Nancy Drumheller, Public Affairs Manager, (804)612-0557 or ndrumheller@cvwma.com

CVWMA JOINS U.S. PLASTIC PACT, COMMITTING TO MEET AMBITIOUS CIRCULAR ECONOMY GOALS BY 2025

Led by The Recycling Partnership and World Wildlife Fund in partnership with the Ellen MacArthur Foundation, the U.S. Plastics Pact will unify approaches to rethink the way we design, use, and reuse plastics

Richmond, VA, (AUGUST 25, 2020) – Today, Central Virginia Waste Management Authority (CVWMA) has joined the U.S. Plastics Pact, a collaborative, solutions-driven initiative rooted in four ambitious goals intended to drive significant systems change by unifying diverse cross-sector approaches, setting a national strategy, and creating scalable solutions to create a path forward toward a circular economy for plastics in the United States by 2025. The first North American Pact of its kind, the U.S. Pact is a collaboration led by The Recycling Partnership, World Wildlife Fund (WWF), and Ellen MacArthur Foundation.

As part of the U.S. Pact, activators like CVWMA recognize that significant, systemwide change is imperative to realize a circular economy for plastics. As such, the U.S. Pact will convene more than 60+ brands, retailers, NGOs, and government agencies across the plastics value chain to bring one voice to U.S. packaging through coordinated initiatives and innovative solutions for rethinking products, packaging, and business models.

“We are excited to be part of the U.S. Plastics Pact, furthering our mission to affect change that is productive and that will have lasting positive impacts on the environment locally and globally,” said Kim Hynes, Executive Director of the CVWMA.

As a founding Activator of the U.S. Plastics Pact, CVWMA has agreed to collectively deliver against these four ambitious goals:

  1. Define a list of packaging to be designated as problematic or unnecessary by 2021 and take measures to eliminate them by 2025. ​
  2. By 2025, all plastic packaging is 100% reusable, recyclable, or compostable. ​
  3. By 2025, undertake ambitious actions to effectively recycle or compost 50% of plastic packaging.
  4. By 2025, the average recycled content or responsibly sourced bio-based content in plastic packaging will be 30%. ​

While the U.S. Pact is complementary to, and follows the ambitious precedents set by the existing global network of Plastic Pacts, it will be tailored to meet the unique needs and challenges of the U.S. market. The Pact will reflect national priorities and realities, while still propelling the nation closer to other developed nations in its management of plastic waste.

“Together through the U.S. Plastics Pact, we will ignite system change to accelerate progress toward a circular economy,” says Sarah Dearman, Vice President of Circular Ventures for The Recycling Partnership. “The U.S. Pact will accelerate systemwide change by inspiring and supporting upstream innovation through a coordinated national strategy, creating a unified framework and enabling members to accelerate progress toward our ambitious 2025 sustainability goals. Members’ full participation will be vital to reaching our shared goals.”

Achieving this vision will require new levels of accountability from all facets of the plastics supply chain. The U.S. Pact emphasizes measurable change and as such, CVWMA is committed to transparent, annual reporting, guided by WWF’s ReSource: Plastic Footprint Tracker, which will be used to document annual progress against our four goals. The first task of the founding members of the U.S. Plastics Pact will be to establish a “roadmap” in Q1 2021 to identify key milestones and national solutions to achieving the U.S. targets and realize a circular economy in which plastic never becomes waste.

CVWMA, through public-private partnerships, created and built robust recycling programs, promotes waste reduction and reuse, resulting in millions of tons diverted from landfills over its first 30 years.  CVWMA has and continues to increase awareness, knowledge and access to information and services that result in a positive environmental impact.

###

 

About Central Virginia Waste Management Authority

The Central Virginia Waste Management Authority (CVWMA) is a regional public service authority that implements recycling and solid waste management initiatives for thirteen local governments and the over 1.5 million citizens in central Virginia. CVWMA fosters regional collaboration to provide planning, resources and education in order to reduce, reuse, recycle and manage solid waste for our 13 local government members.  Learn more at www.cvwma.com  

 

About The Recycling Partnership

The Recycling Partnership is a national nonprofit organization that leverages corporate partner funding to transform recycling for good in states, cities, and communities nationwide. As the leading organization in the country that engages the full recycling supply chain from the corporations that manufacture products and packaging to local governments charged with recycling to industry end markets, haulers, material recovery facilities, and converters, The Recycling Partnership positively impacts recycling at every step in the process. Since 2014, the nonprofit change agent diverted 230 million pounds of new recyclables from landfills, saved 465 million gallons of water, avoided more than 250,000 metric tons of greenhouse gases, and drove significant reductions in targeted contamination rates. Learn more at www.recyclingpartnership.org

 

About World Wildlife Fund (WWF)

WWF is one of the world’s leading conservation organizations, working in nearly 100 countries for over half a century to help people and nature thrive. With the support of more than 5 million members worldwide, WWF is dedicated to delivering science-based solutions to preserve the diversity and abundance of life on Earth, halt the degradation of the environment and combat the climate crisis. Visit www.worldwildlife.org to learn more and keep up with the latest sustainability news by following @WWFBetterBiz on Twitter and signing up for our newsletter and news alerts here.

 

About The Ellen MacArthur Foundation

The Ellen MacArthur Foundation was launched in 2010 with the aim of accelerating the transition to the circular economy. Since its creation, the charity has emerged as a global thought leader, putting the circular economy on the agenda of decision-makers around the world. The charity’s work focuses on seven key areas: insight and analysis; business; institutions, governments, and cities; systemic initiatives; circular design; learning; and communications.

Further information: www.ellenmacarthurfoundation.org | @circulareconomy

 

About The New Plastics Economy and The Plastics Pact

Since 2016, the Ellen MacArthur Foundation’s New Plastics Economy initiative has rallied businesses and governments behind a positive vision of a circular economy for plastic. Its 2016 and 2017 New Plastics Economy reports captured worldwide headlines, revealing the financial and environmental costs of waste plastic and pollution.

The Plastics Pact is a global network of initiatives that brings together all key stakeholders at the national or regional level behind a common vision with a concrete set of ambitious local targets. It builds a unique platform to exchange learnings and best practices across regions to accelerate the transition to a circular economy for plastic – a New Plastics Economy – in which it never becomes waste or pollution.

Further information: www.newplasticseconomy.org | @circulareconomy

Category: , , , , , , , , , , , , ,