— By Elaine Burridge — 

A transition from single-use plastic (SUP) pallet wraps to a reusable solution would come with additional costs that could be another blow to Europe’s competitiveness, according to the results of a study commissioned by the European Plastics Converters (EuPC, Brussels; www.plasticsconverters.eu) association.

Looking at eight key sectors, the study sees carbon emissions rising by up to 1700%, with an estimated additional annual cost of EUR 4.9 bn. EuPC noted that the impact across the EU could be more substantial.

The trade body commissioned Belgian sustainability consultancy RDC Environment (Brussels; www.rdcenvironment.be) to analyse the impacts of a switch because of the EU’s Packaging and Packaging Waste Regulation (PPWR), which from August 2026 establishes various reuse targets for pallet wrapping as well as possible exemptions in cases of “particular economic constraints encountered in a specific sector”.

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The report evaluates the economics of shifting from SUP wraps and hoods – the most commonly used transport packaging – to PPWR-compliant alternatives, such as reusable hoods and reusable, stackable crates/pallet boxes. It focuses on eight industrial sectors in the EU, namely agriculture, cement, construction, milk, glass, plastics, retail, and water.

The plastic products analysed were a 1-litre HDPE milk bottle (filled), a 25 kg bag of plastic pellets, and a 1.5-litre PET bottle (filled), for the milk, plastics, and water sectors, respectively.

Data was primarily gathered from four site visits and 31 interviews to identify the functionalities provided by the different types of pallet packaging and their related costs.

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The results showed that a switch to reusable pallet packaging systems at EU level in the long term would incur additional annual production costs of EUR 297 mn (+2.2%) on the milk bottles, EUR 167 mn (+0.3%) on the pellet bags, and EUR 947 mn (+2.7%) on the PET bottles.

The extra costs are mainly driven by the additional machines needed for an automated end of line and the price of the reusable packaging itself.

Higher production costs of the reusable packaging systems would also impact the EU’s “cost-sensitive” exports, according to the analysis, which noted, “Economic operators exporting in and out of the EU will also likely have to maintain the single-use palletising systems currently in use throughout the world for exports”.

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This means manufacturers having to operate both single-use and reusable systems simultaneously across facilities in the short to medium term, leading to complicated logistics and the co-existence of multiple competing reusable standards.

The results of the study relied on several assumptions because of the lack of alternative reusable systems being used at scale presently. RPC Environment cited “much uncertainty” in the market about moving at scale from a manual to an automated and optimised reusable system. Therefore, it said the study considered a long-term scenario where adapted reusable solutions are used at a large scale and compatible with automated systems.

EuPC has said previously it intends to use the results of the study to inform a “constructive dialogue” with European legislators on the design of the PPWR’s implementation regulations.