Project STOP – tackling ocean plastic leakage

PROJECT STOP – TACKLING OCEAN PLASTIC LEAKAGE

The problem of ocean plastics remains a crucial issue for the plastics packaging industry. Elisabeth Skoda takes a closer look at Project Stop, which aims to address the challenge at the source, gaining insights from project founders SYSTEMIQ and Borealis. She talks to Joi Danielson, Asia Programme Director at SYSTEMIQ, and Craig Halgreen, Sustainability & Public affairs Director at Borealis.

ES: To start off: Joi, can you give us a brief overview of SYSTEMIQ’s work?

JD: We are a group of leaders committed to working together to stop environmental destruction, and to reduce deepening social inequalities. We work in three areas: renewable energy, land use and material use. As a company we work at the systems level. We think for true change to happen you have to adjust the underlying system. We work on an advisory capacity with different companies, integrating new ventures and mobilizing large-scale capital towards climate action and UN SDGs.

ES: Can you tell us a bit more about what inspired Project Stop and give us a quick overview of what the project would like to achieve?

JD: I think all of us were impatient to see real change in ocean plastic and wanted to work on a project that resulted in permanent reduction. Up to this point we hadn’t been seeing many real shifts on the ground. The idea with Borealis and SYSTEMIQ was to create a front-line project that resulted in permanent reduction with zero leakage.

We partner with cities with very little if any waste management in place and put a team on the ground for two to three years to build circular economically sustainable zero leakage waste systems. The systems should be circular in nature so as many non-organic materials recycled and non-organic materials composted as possible. This creates better social and economic situations for the cities we work with. ES: And Craig – what made Borealis decide to create this project together with SYSTEMIQ?

CH: For Borealis, as a manufacturer of a wide range of plastic products, it is distressing when you see the visuals of animals and sea life with plastics in their bellies etc. No responsible company could continue to operate and do nothing about this. We believe that life demands progress. Of course we need to manufacture the plastics that people need and plastics can provide a high quality of life, but at the same time we had to do something about the end of life. We saw an opportunity to join forces with SYSTEMIQ and create something that could stop the leakage of plastics into the ocean. I think the greatest input from both companies is the pragmatic ‘let’s get it done’ attitude. Walk rather than talk.

ES: On a more general level, why did you choose Indonesia as the location for Project Stop?

CH: It’s the country that has the second highest leakage into the sea; I think China is first but it would have been more complicated for us to go there.

JD: Indonesia has one of the lowest waste collection rates for its GDP per capita in the world so only 39% of waste is actually collected. The choice is therefore to burn or dump waste and sometimes they dump it in the water. What this means is you have 40 million tonnes going into the environment every year which has huge environmental, health, social and economic consequences.

Joi Danielson Craig Halgreen

ES: Why do you think it is that such a big proportion of these ocean plastics come from Asia? Why is the problem so serious there?

JD: They are developing economies, and oftentimes the pace of development is faster than the waste management system can keep up with. You have a very different consumer behaviour than you did 10 or 15 years ago. We find many similarities in countries with low waste collection levels but there is always a different mix of challenges.

CH: I would add that the geographical nature of the countries is quite specific. Indonesia has something like 17,000 islands and some are quite small. In the Philippines it is the same so it’s very difficult to put effective waste management systems in place.

ES: Could you tell us more about the work you do in different Indonesian cities? What have been the challenges in setting up different or more sustainable systems?

JD: We target cities where the need is highest and where there is very strong governmental will to change the situation. When we get here we have to develop a full waste management system, from buying trucks and tricycles to building governance systems, laws and regulations, behaviour change, building sorting facilities etc. so we can make a circular waste system. What’s lovely about Indonesia is that there are lots of different types of groups so we work with: women’s groups, religious groups etc. and most of the cities we work in also have very strong fishing communities so in all there can be more than 1000 people inputting into each city and it becomes THEIR waste system. We create it together with them so they have ownership and we stay there for multiple years to make sure it’s embedded and economically sustainable before we leave.

ES: How scalable and transferrable is this process to other cities and countries around the world?

JD: I think this overarching model of supporting cities can be replicated all around the world. The specifics would need to be customized, however. We have tended to work in small-to-medium cities but there are also megacities or extremely remote smaller areas such as remote islands that again require a very different type of solution. We are trying to grow so we can figure out new archetypes and create ‘play-books’ for each of these. Then it can get a bit easier and more efficient each time.

CH: We started off with Muncar in Java with 130,000 people and the second city was Pasuruan in Java with about one million people. The third city is Jembrana, Bali, which is different in that it is only an island and more mountainous. So there is some transferability to other archetypes even now. I think it also proves some level of scalability.

JD: What we see with projects around the world is a mushroom effect. There will be a successful pilot then areas close to it will learn from it so there will then be a cluster of locations showing progress but often you don’t really get beyond that. If you really want to change across the entire country you can’t just do the city work so it’s really about using the city work as examples of what’s possible but also working top-down on the root cause structural constraints that have made the waste collection so low in the first place. Governance, for example.

ES: What would you stay are the next steps for the project in the coming years?

CH: I certainly can see us expanding where we are today in Muncar but there’s a great opportunity to take what we’ve learned in the city across the region and I think that’s probably the immediate step. We also have some great sorting plants that are nearly complete so it’s all about getting the work done.

ES: Could you share some success stories?

CH: One critical success point is the partners we have on board. Without companies putting their money and expertise on the table this wouldn’t happen. Of course Borealis is the mainstay in this but since we started we have engaged the Norwegian Embassy, NOVA Chemicals, Borouge, and from the packaging side we have Nestle and the Alliance to End Plastic Waste. Most recently. Siegwerk has also come on board. I think the way that SYSTEMIQ has been able to build a very solid team of local individuals with a lot of experience building a circular economy that is suitable for their environment is quite phenomenal. It’s amazing how committed the people in the local teams are and how much they have learned.

JD: Just to give some numbers. We’ve just passed bringing waste collection to 100,000 people who have never had this before; we’ve also stopped more than 7000 tonnes of waste going into the environment. We’ve also created many safe, reliable green jobs that are valuable in the community. We’re the first to trial different types of governance systems that have never been used for waste management. We’re also going to be trialling plastic credits and that funding goes into helping the operating costs of the system.

In our first project city of Muncar, we hear that spawning areas are coming back where they hadn’t had fish for years so that is heartening as it proves that change can happen.

ES: In conclusion, collaboration across the value chain is key. But what can be done on a government level and across the value chain to address the problem?

CH: For a circular economy to work we need to have products designed for this in the first place. We can put mechanical recycling into Indonesia etc. but for that to happen efficiently you need to have products that are easy to recycle. Therefore the packaging and plastic industries need to go back to square one and start designing products for circularity. In some cases we may have to reinvent the type of packaging or redistribution models that we’ve been used to. If we continue the way we are today then packages will continue to go to landfills rather than being used as the valuable materials that they are. The industry should look at designing products for circularity and recyclability. We were so focused before on the functionality of the packaging itself that we over-engineered some solutions and now when it comes to end of life we don’t know what to do with the waste.

JD: In countries like Indonesia there are two challenges. First is the lack of collection, so you need to set up new waste systems where before they didn’t exist; and there’s a second effort that really needs to make sure that once those systems are set up they are economically sustainable and robust longterm. You also need more funding going into the waste system. It generally costs around 18 dollars per person per year to provide circular waste management services but in Indonesia there’s around 65–90 cents per person being spent. We’re trying to get voluntary and mandatory EPR systems in place, but then once you have accountability you also need to have strong, transparent governance systems. What needs to be done is actually fairly simple, but that doesn’t mean it’s easy to implement. n