Crocco and ExxonMobil Collaborate to Support a More Circular Economy for Plastics
Innovating for Today and Tomorrow
Crocco, a key player in flexible packaging, is renowned for its quality, innovation, and strong commitment to sustainability. As a family-run business with over 50 years of experience, Crocco produces plastic films that wrap, contain, and protect a wide range of industrial and everyday products, including food, household items, pharmaceuticals, and more.
The Challenge
Plastics are present in the products we use daily, helping keep us safe. They are found in bicycle helmets, child car seats, automotive airbags, and cell phones. Plastics also help keep the food we eat fresh and safe. While plastics provide numerous benefits to society, there is a growing demand for packaging that delivers sustainability benefits—a challenge that becomes even more pressing in applications like food packaging, which must meet strict safety and quality standards. Traditional mechanical recycling breaks plastics into smaller pieces and melts them to create a limited range of new products. Over time, plastics can degrade and may not always be suitable for sensitive contact applications.
Crocco's primary goal is to bring to market high-quality, high-performance packaging solutions for direct food contact that are safe for their customers. Additionally, it is crucial to ensure compliance with high organoleptic standards, such as odor control for pet food packaging.
Beyond this, Crocco aims to support an alternative end-of-life approach for plastics.
The Solution
To tackle these challenges, Crocco collaborated with ExxonMobil to purchase certified circular plastics by leveraging its Exxtend™ technology for advanced recycling. Certified circular plastics are virgin-quality plastics accompanied by a certificate linking the mass of certified circular plastics Crocco purchases to a corresponding amount of plastic waste ExxonMobil has processed back into usable raw materials through advanced recycling. Advanced recycling complements mechanical recycling, enabling more significant amounts of hard-to-recycle plastics—those that cannot be easily recycled mechanically—to be diverted from landfills or incineration.
Crocco uses these certified circular plastics to create its plastic films and food bags. This allows the company to meet stringent safety requirements for sensitive contact applications, such as food packaging, while assuring its customers of sustainable solutions. By incorporating certified circular plastics, Crocco is playing a role in diverting plastic waste from landfills and incineration and supporting the use of plastic waste as an alternative to fossil-based raw materials.
The Importance of Mass Balance
The Exxtend™ technology for advanced recycling, which enables ExxonMobil to supply certified circular plastics, is supported by a mass balance attribution approach that links the processed plastic waste to the certified circular plastics sold. Advanced recycling technology converts plastic waste at the molecular level into virgin-quality raw materials for the production of many valuable products. Since the raw materials derived from plastic waste are mixed with fossil-derived raw materials within the same system, it is not possible to identify which molecules come from plastic waste and which from fossil-based raw materials.
As a result, ExxonMobil uses a reliable, transparent, third-party-certified mass balance approach to attribute raw material inputs to product outputs. According to this independently certified and verifiable methodology, the mass of plastic waste processed through advanced recycling, net of production losses, is attributed to the mass of certified circular plastic sold. The quantity of usable raw materials produced from plastic waste is then assigned to new certified circular plastics using the ISCC PLUS mass balance approach, with the "determined by mass" option and "certified free attribution." These certified circular plastics are identical to existing products, meaning they maintain the same quality and performance and can be safely used in food and medical applications with stringent quality regulations.
The Outcome
With the help of ExxonMobil's Exxtend™ technology, Crocco is successfully producing packaging solutions that meet the necessary safety and performance standards while helping the company and its customers achieve their environmental goals, including fostering a more circular economy. This collaboration not only marks a significant step forward in Crocco's ongoing efforts to innovate and pioneer the adoption of sustainable packaging but also sets an example of utilizing plastic waste as a raw material.
"As a leading manufacturer of plastic films, we are thrilled to integrate certified circular plastics into our production process. This innovative approach ensures we maintain the high standards of quality and performance our customers expect. Embracing certified circular plastics is a significant step toward a more sustainable future for our industry," said Stefano Zelcher, Purchasing Director at Crocco.
"As pioneers in advanced recycling, we are proud to provide Crocco with high-quality certified circular plastics that meet the stringent demands of today's market. Our innovative process transforms plastic waste into valuable resources, giving them a new life as valuable products. By choosing our certified circular plastics, you contribute to a more circular economy for plastics. Together, we can help address plastic waste," said Alfredo Nasta, PE Market Development Manager, ExxonMobil.
