Project Fact Sheet – Updated March 2010
European Plastics Converting Industry Voluntary Long-Term Agreement on Energy Efficiency
(EuPlastVoltage)
Programme area:
Main area, main key action
Coordinator:
EuPC
European Plastics Converters, Belgium
E-mail: antonino.furfari@eupc.org
Tel: + 32 2 732 41 24
SenterNovem, The Netherlands
Association of Hungarian Plastics Industry, Hungary
Asociación Española de Industriales de Plasticos, Spain
British Plastics Federation, United Kingdom
IK Industrievereinigung Kinststoffverpackungen e.V., Germany
Vereniging van producenten van Kunststof en rubberartikelen, Belgium
Fraunhofer – Gesellschaft zur Förderung der angewandten Forschung e.V., Germany
Federatie Nederlandse Rubber en Kunststofindustrie, The Netherlands
Fédération de la Plasturgie, France
Associação Portuguesa de Indústria de Plásticos, Portugal
www.euplastvoltage.eu
Partners:
Website:
Benefits
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The objective of this project is to prepare a voluntary long-term agreement on energy
efficiency for the European plastics converting industry.
Keywords:
Plastics, voluntary, agreement
Duration:
Budget:
Contract number:
24 months (June 2009 – May 2011)
€ 810,232.00 (EU contribution: €597,069.00 – 73.69%)
EE/08/554/SI2.528400
Summary
The plastics converting industry is composed of 50,000 SMEs and 1.6 million employees spread across the 27
Member States. In general these companies do not have enough assets, human resources or knowledge to
improve their energy efficiency. However, this industry is willing to actively participate in the Climate Action of the
European Union through its strong associative network in Europe. Moreover, there is strong pressure to strengthen
competitiveness and sustainability of the European plastics converting by the sector itself.
The objective of this project is to prepare a voluntary agreement for the European plastics converting industry. This
action will bring together experience and best practices at national and industry levels, with the aim to create a
long-term agreement at European level. Amongst others, energy saving targets as well as the type of voluntary
agreement will be analysed during the project. The project will base part of its activities on previous or ongoing IEE
projects - in particular RECIPE and ENER-Plast for the sector - in order to build on best practice.
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Expected and/or achieved results
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Market transformation: This action will indirectly introduce and promote the concept of energy services in
industry and will tackle untapped energy savings potentials in the plastics converting industry.
Changing behaviour: This voluntary long-term agreement will lead to exchanges of know-how and experience
between energy managers. For instance, the Dutch energy managers, who have significant experience of
Voluntary Agreements, will exchange their experience with energy managers from other countries.
Training: as mentioned above this project will create conditions to have further training on energy efficiency
practices not only in the plastics industry but potentially in other industry by a spin-off effect.
Access capital: The reduction of energy consumption within the targeted European industry will lead to
improved financial performance. As a result, access to capital will be increased, leading to further investment in
energy efficiency.
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The first achievement of the project has been to finish the pre-study work (package). This work gave the
possibility to gather important information for the following project activities.
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Currently the impact assessment is being finalised and this important study will give the tools to tailor an
effective voluntary agreement scheme to the targeted industry
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An important result is that the industry and authorities at various levels are becoming aware that the plastics
converting industry is working on a voluntary agreement. Positive feedback and interest have been received by
the stakeholders.
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