The HolyGrail 2.0 / Digital Watermarks Initiative!
The HolyGrail 2.0 programme is in the last stages of research and development in preparation for market entrance and the introduction of a pilot market in France in 2024, which will include sorting and reprocessing experiments for digitally watermarked hard packaging, flexible plastics, and other materials.
For 2024, the Digital Watermarks Initiative will begin a trial programme in France to identify plastics for recycling. The trial will feature companies such as Henkel, L’Oréal, P&G, Citeo, Digimarc, Pellenc, and Veolia.
Digital Watermarks and its potential effect on Plastic Packaging. (Alliance To End Plastics Waste, Oct 2023).
In the French market, digital watermarks will be applied to HDPE rigid packaging from companies such as Henkel, L’Oréal, and P&G.
After being collected from France’s kerbside collections, they will be evaluated at Veolia’s PlastiLoop Brenouille plant. They will be sorted using Pellenc and Digimarc technology to differentiate upgraded non-food HDPE from non-watermarked packaging.
In addition, Holy Grail 2.0 will conduct research and development to recognise, sort, and expel PP flexibles made by PepsiCO and LDPE flexibles produced by Essity and P&G.
This trial will take place at the German materials recovery facility Hündgen Entsorgung. A three-month trial at the same location, will test sorting rigids from the Danish and German marketplaces by Holy Grail 2.0 members.
The introduction of digital watermarks could be revolutionary for plastic processing companies UK and EU and also the recycling industry as a whole. More information at Pioneering Digital Watermarks | Holy Grail 2.0.