Re|focus Sustainability Innovation Awards

The Re|focus Sustainability Innovation awards provide a platform for sharing and celebrating some of the great work being done across the globe to push sustainability in manufacturing forward. These awards are designed to recognize outstanding innovations in plastics manufacturing that further environmental advantages in design, material, and end of life management. Each submission is judged on the following three criteria:

• Innovation: How novel is the idea being proposed?
• Environmental impact: How significant is the environmental benefit?
• Market impact: How scalable is this innovation? How significant would the market impact be if it were to reach commercialization?
   

These awards, along with the Innovation in Bioplastics Award, are presented annually at our Re|focus Sustainability & Recycling Summit. This year’s event will take place from May 1 – 3 in Minneapolis, MN.

The 2024 Sustainability Innovation Award nomination period will open in October 2023. To be notified when the nominations period opens, email hnortz@plasticsindustry.org

Award Categories

Leadership in Sustainability Innovation Award
Awards the "front-runner" in all areas of the judging criteria. This winner can be an applicant of any of the three categories.

Sustainable Innovation in Design Award
Awards an innovation in product, equipment, or process design that appeals to recyclability, anti-litter, compostability, and innovation in equipment allowing for new product design.

Sustainable Innovation in Materials Award
Awards an innovation in or use of bioplastics, recycled content, and additives for upcycling.

Sustainable Innovation in End-of-Life Award
Awards an innovation in recycling or composting process or equipment.

People's Choice Award
All nominations for the Innovation awards qualify to be a part of the People's Choice Award contest. All proposals will be shared on PLASTICS' social media channels and the nominee with the most votes wins.

Awards Archive

PLASTICS is proud to have awarded these five honors since 2019. Take a look at the previous winners of the Re|focus Sustainability Innovation Awards.

2023 – Coming Soon!

2022

Leadership in Sustainability Innovation Award winner – Ford Motor Company; Seat Clip in the Ford Bronco Sport made of 100% Recycled Ocean Plastic ‘Ghost Gear', Nanocellulose Enhanced Flexible PU Foams used for automotive parts, and industry's first closed loop recycling of Additive Manufacturing Waste to replace injection molded automotive parts. 
Sustainable Innovation in Design Award winner – Klockner Pentaplast; fully recyclable pharmaceutical blister film - kpNext™ R1. 
Sustainable Innovation in Materials Award winner – Starlinger viscotec; rPET100 - a heat resistant and fully recyclable sheet material to be used in thermoformed packaging. 
Sustainable Innovation in End-of-Life Award winner – JP Industrial Products; AERO (Aspiration-Elutriation-Reduction-Optimization) Screening Technology. 
People's Choice Award winner – Novoloop, Inc.; Oistre™ advanced recycled Thermoplastic Urethane (TPU). 

2021

Leadership in Sustainability Innovation Award winner – Chevron Phillips Chemical; converting difficult-to-recycle plastic waste into top-quality raw materials.
Sustainable Innovation in Design Award winner – Garçon Wines; beautifully designed, space-, weight- and energy-saving flat bottle made entirely from recycled PET plastic.
Sustainable Innovation in Materials Award winner – Ford Motor Company; composite incorporating biomaterial from coffee manufacturing which is 17% lighter, requiring 25% less energy to produce and more sustainable than the talc-filled material that was its predecessor.
Sustainable Innovation in End-of-Life Award winner – Digimarc Corporation; digital watermarking solution, or “digital recycling passport”, that increases the accuracy and efficiency of the recycling process to drive a more circular economy.
People's Choice Award winner – Ford Otosan; automotive fan shroud that is produced with 50% recycled material and reduces the CO2 produced in the manufacturing process.

Read more about the 2021 Award Winners on our Re|focus Website.
 

2020

Leadership in Sustainability Innovation Award winner – PureCycle Technologies; physical separation and purification process that does not require any chemical reactions and uses similar operating conditions comparable to current polyolefin (PP and PE) production.
Sustainable Innovation in Design Award & People’s Choice Award winner – Accredo Packaging; The AccredoFlex® RP™ Gen2 pouch is an all-polyethylene, fully recyclable stand-up pouch consisting of up to 25% bio-based resin and made with solar and wind energy.
Sustainable Innovation in Materials Award winner – Vartega; reclaimed and recycled carbon fiber that enables the diversion of thousands of tons of carbon fiber from the landfill. 
Sustainable Innovation in End-of-Life Award winner – Eastman; Carbon Renewal Technology (CRT), which breaks down waste plastics into molecular building blocks like carbon, oxygen and hydrogen and turns those building blocks into new, virgin-quality plastics.

2019

Leadership in Sustainability Innovation Award winner – UBQ Materials; propriety conversion process of converting household waste into sustainable biobased materials.
Sustainable Innovation in Design Award winner – Tarkett; ethos® Modular Carpet Tile with Omnicoat Technology which was created using recycled material from disposed windshields and safety glass.
Sustainable Innovation in Materials Award winner – Dell; Latitude 5000 Notebook which contains a structural material for a notebook computer housing that is 50-percent recycled content by weight and still meets the toughest durability requirements.
Sustainable Innovation in End-of-Life Award winner – Circular Polymers/Broadview Group; Rotary Impact Separator which disassembles post-consumer carpet into clean face fiber, clean backing fiber and a limestone granulate.
People's Choice Award winner – iMFLUX; philosophy and method for injection molding called the “Green Curve”.