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If more plastics processors are to incorporate recycled materials into their products, in response to customer demand or regulation, investment in quality systems will be necessary across the supply chain. Recyclers and converters of recycled materials need robust material traceability systems to ensure the reclaimed feedstock is appropriate for the desired application. This is especially true for products that are used in food or personal care applications, whether as packaging, containers or durable goods.

A paper published in () drew wide media coverage to the evidence that flame retardants — including brominated flame retardants — are making their way into black plastic products, even those used in food-contact applications. Brominated flame retardants are also used in electronics manufacturing such as enclosures and cabling.

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While an arithmetic error in the paper has drawn criticism, the presence of flame retardants in cookware has not been a subject of dispute and is not unique to this study.

Various items were sampled, including kitchen utensils and food serviceware. Levels of bromine ranged widely, up to tens of thousands of parts per million (ppm). Further testing showed 85% of the bromine-positive samples contained flame retardants. The 11 flame-retardant compounds detected include brominated flame retardants such as decabromodiphenyl ether (decaBDE) and tetrabromobisphenol A (TBBPA).

Research studies show brominated flame retardants have in humans and animals. These materials are not authorized for food-contact use, according to the FDA. They can migrate into food during use, becoming “indirect food additives.” The regulation of indirect food additives is covered by , which lists the appropriate polymers for food contact use and associated additives.

The FDA has acted in the past to prevent such items from entering the U.S. market. In October 2024, the FDA published an red listing for a variety of food-contact items, including three products containing brominated flame retardants.

Brominated flame retardants were found in black plastic cookware, according to a 2024 study published in the journal Chemosphere, a 2018 study published in the journal Science of the Total Environment and a 2013 study published in the journal Food Additives & Contaminants. Source: Getty Images.

Environmental Status

Brominated flame retardants present an environmental challenge because of their toxicity, persistence and bioaccumulation. Environmental regulations have widely banned the manufacture of two of the chemicals — decaBDE and hexabromocyclododecane (HBCD) — as persistent organic pollutants. Both have been targeted for elimination by the Stockholm Convention, to which 186 nations are party. In the U.S. (not among these), the manufacture and processing of decaBDE is prohibited (), with an exception for recycling of decaBDE-containing recycled plastics. Concentrations found in the Liu study are up to 11,900 mg/kg — which is 10 times what would be allowed in a new product if it was not recycled (0.1% by weight is the unintentional limit).

The EPA has established an oral reference dose for decaBDE of 7 µg/kg/day. As originally published, the Liu paper mistakenly said this would correspond to 42 µg/day for a 60 kg individual rather than 420 µg/day. The error could lead to an inflated perception of risk relative to the predicted doses up to 34.7 µg/day. The authors have since published an .

The oral reference dose estimates the amount, within an order of magnitude, that could be ingested without ill effects. It does not establish the level that can be present in food products, which falls under food additive regulations.

FDA Concerns About BFRs

A previous paper used simulated cooking conditions to show that flame retardants readily transfer from kitchen utensils to cooking oil. Liu’s paper uses the resulting migration rate, along with its own concentration data, to calculate estimated doses.

Based on the material types and flame retardants detected, the study’s authors suggest — as have the authors of similar previous studies — the source of the material may be recycled electronics. According to an FDA spokesperson, recycled electronics are not deemed to be a safe source of recycled material for food-contact plastic products. The FDA’s safety concerns with recycled plastic materials are that contaminants from recycled material may end up in the final product; that recycled material not regulated for food contact use may be incorporated; or that adjuvants in recycled plastic may not comply with regulations for food-contact use.

It is the responsibility of manufacturers to ensure that any recycled materials meet the same safety regulations that govern virgin raw materials. However, the FDA does offer detailed guidance on practices to prevent the introduction of contaminants in the production process.

Existing Road Map to Safe Recycled Materials

Recyclers can submit a prenotification consultation (PNC) notifying the agency of its intent to use a particular stream of postconsumer materials for certain conditions of use. The FDA will evaluate the quality controls described, and often request additional information. If satisfied, the FDA will issue a letter of “no objection” (NOL) if it agrees that the quality controls in place are expected to produce a safe product.

Obtaining an NOL signals to converters of recycled plastic that the supplier has sufficient controls in place. It is up to the recycler to maintain these practices, and up to the converter to audit the supplier and confirm these practices are being actively followed.

“The industry really polices itself,” says Kevin Cronin, VP of sustainability and R&D at , a large recycler of polypropylene that has successfully obtained NOLs. Ultra-Poly and other recyclers that offer “FDA grade” materials have procedures for physically isolating food-grade from non-FDA grade materials. Some Ultra-Poly customers buy only food-contact materials (even if some of the material only goes into applications where it is unnecessary) in the interest of avoiding even the possibility of cross contamination.  

According to Cronin, audits can be extensive. “Frequently it takes a full day. They want to see the paper trail, they want to see the chain of custody. They want to see that, once the material gets here, it can’t get co-mingled with a non-FDA grade material, for instance — all the steps that are part of our Good Manufacturing Process (GMP) — and they want to see that it is actually being executed,” Cronin says.

The NOL process does not apply to postindustrial recycling (although the FDA does offer guidance in this area as well). However, the material streams do not necessarily come from curbside pickup either. In Ultra-Poly’s case, the company partnered with a major retailer to recycle polypropylene (PP) used to make coat hangers. In this case, the NOL states that Ultra-Poly has demonstrated that the material is homopolymer PP without additives that would negate its safety.

The NOL specifies , A through J, for which the quality controls are deemed to be sufficient. Ultra-Poly’s aforementioned PP is used in a cosmetic product at room temperature, so it has conditions of use E, F and G, which is appropriate because there is no thermal treatment in the container. More stringent requirements are required for applications that contact food under conditions that involve sterilizing at high temperature (condition of use “A”), for example, or cooking (condition of use “J”).

“We as an industry need to be more diligent about things. That requires everybody across the value chain to dot the i’s and cross the t’s.”

The FDA also provides a on using recycled materials in food packaging, with recommendations for postindustrial, postconsumer and chemical recyclers regarding where and how these materials could become compromised and actions that should be taken to mitigate. These include testing procedures to confirm the recycling process is capable of removing harmful contaminants, the results of which would accompany a successful PNC. The guide states that a dietary intake of 1.5 µg/day of contaminant would generally be considered of negligible risk.

While curbside recycling programs are increasingly accepting and sorting PP, recyclers like Ultra-Poly are identifying other, more controlled sources in the distribution chain.

One of the challenges of PP is the wide variety of shapes and colors that are used. In a traditional mechanical recycling process, mixed color feedstock produces a dark gray-green. According to recyclers, matching a light color or obtaining a clear pellet is a far greater challenge than making a darker color such as black.

Black polypropylene is not rare in the marketplace, matching the safety requirements of the feedstream and application is key. Source: Matt Stonecash.

The NOL process has not proven to be an insurmountable hurdle to those companies that have pursued it. Since 1990, the FDA has

A popular brand of plastic utensils, OXO, was contacted for a consumer brand perspective on sourcing and tracing recycled materials, but has not responded at the time of this writing.

Guidance exists for converters and brands that seek to incorporate recycled materials in their products and appropriate recycled material is available, but the responsibility remains with individual companies and their customers to strive for and demand the highest safety standards. To maintain public trust, they will need the right quality controls in place to ensure that the feedstock is a appropriate to the product use.