Packaging Industry

The EU Packaging and Packaging Waste Regulation (PPWR), Regulation (EU) 2025/40, has applied since 12 August 2026 and materially changes the compliance landscape for companies placing packaging or packaged products on the EU market. The Regulation reinforces packaging minimisation, recyclability, recycled-content requirements for relevant plastic packaging, reuse and refill measures, labelling and extended producer responsibility. This shifts packaging work from general improvement programmes toward product-level evidence: companies need reliable data on material composition and weight, packaging formats, recycled content, recyclability and the performance of alternatives.

In practice, priority projects include packaging lightweighting, elimination of unnecessary components, mono-material or easily separable structures, increased recycled content, reuse models and redesign of transport packaging. Comparative LCA and Product Carbon Footprint studies are important because interventions can create trade-offs between material production, logistics, product protection and end-of-life performance. For multi-market portfolios, structured packaging inventories and traceable data models are becoming as important as the design intervention itself. Companies should also align packaging claims with measurable evidence to reduce greenwashing risk and support customer and regulatory scrutiny.

Metsims supports packaging manufacturers, brands and packaging users from baseline measurement through redesign and regulatory readiness. Life Cycle Assessment and Product Carbon Footprint studies can identify environmental hotspots and compare alternative materials, weights, formats and reuse scenarios. Recyclability, recycled-content and circularity assessments can translate PPWR requirements into product-specific action plans, while eco-design studies can evaluate whether material reduction or substitution creates a genuine life-cycle benefit.

At portfolio level, Metsims can support packaging data mapping, Scope 3 calculations, supplier-data collection and sustainability performance systems so that regulatory and customer requests can be answered consistently. Where packaging changes affect product declarations or corporate targets, the same underlying data can be connected to LCA, PCF, Scope 3 and decarbonisation work.

The objective is to move from isolated packaging claims to a measurable decision framework linking compliance, design, environmental performance and implementation.

Industrial understanding and multidisciplinary depth. Select an advisor to open their dedicated Metsims profile.