Studies on the usability of recycled PET for food packaging applications

The need of and opportunities for recycling of plastics for food packaging have been recognized, and a lot of work to find meaningful and cost-effective solutions to this issue is in progress. The safety of recycled plastics for food contact use is largely dictated by the ability of post-consumer contaminants to absorb into recycled materials and later diffuse from recycled plastics into the food. The objective of the present study was to establish a suitable analytical approach to identifying and quantifying any chemical substances that derive from the earlier use and remain in the polyethylene terephthalate (PET). A simple gas chromatographic technique using flame ionization detection was developed to allow quantification of solvent extractable compounds in a series of recycled PET samples. Identification of the nature and extent of contaminants in the PET samples was also attempted using GC/MS analysis.