A new policy briefing by waste advocacy group Zero Waste Europe (ZWE) argues for tougher chemical policy measures to be included in the European Commission’s upcoming Circular Economy Act (CEA) to avoid a future public health crisis.
The briefing, Building a healthy circular economy: Integrating chemicals, products and waste under the Circular Economy Act, warns that disregarding chemical policy within the CEA will have significant health and economic costs.
A policy tension has long existed between the pressure to maximise recycling rates vs the need to protect consumers from harmful chemicals. While governments set targets to boost the recycling of materials such as plastics, textiles and electronics, the fact remains that many of these items contain hazardous materials (often added decades ago, although many are still being added today). To simply recycle such items risks harmful exposures via the recycled material streams, or in new products, or via the spread of contamination in other ways.
Dorota Napierska, Toxic-Free Circular Economy Policy Officer at ZWE, stated:
“It is difficult to understand why, after decades of mounting evidence about our exposure to highly hazardous chemicals and their impact on our health, so little action has been taken. Safer chemicals and a high level of transparency should automatically be integrated into new policy regulations, in order to benefit our health and economic security. We cannot build a future-proof, circular economy, while simultaneously harming society.”
The briefing emphasises the urgent need to increase chemical transparency and traceability along the value chain, in order to tackle the issue of human chemical exposure and material contamination. For the transition towards a circular economy to be sustainable in the long term, the briefing strongly advises putting an end to trade-offs between increasing recycling rates, and minimising consumer and environmental exposure to harmful chemicals.
There are systemic reasons behind these trade-offs, one of which appears related to the traditional silo-ing of chemicals and waste policy. Recyclers are typically not required to know what chemicals are in the waste they process, for example.
Another issue is the ongoing presence of legacy products, manufactured decades ago prior to the introduction of safeguards against using many materials now known to be hazardous.
Co-author Lauriane Veillard, Chemical Recycling and Plastic-to-Fuels Policy Officer at ZWE, said:
“Despite the headlines, the transition towards a circular economy cannot solely rely on recycling. The entire system needs to change in order to stop producing products that contain dangerous chemicals, and to start systematically tracing existing chemicals in the value chain. We cannot request recyclers to address all the problems related to a material without even knowing what chemicals it contains.”
With the CEA due for adoption in 2026, ZWE urges the European Commission to harness circularity and competitiveness to develop a healthy, safe and non-toxic circular economy that will truly benefit the public’s health and economic wellbeing.
