Go Back
Elif joins AIM’s Digital Watermarks Initiative HolyGrail 2.0
Elif has joined the Digital Watermarks Initiative HolyGrail 2.0, facilitated by AIM, the European Brands Association. In doing so, Elif has become one of the over 85 companies and organizations to participate in this pilot project to prove the viability of digital watermarking technologies to enable better sorting and higher quality recycling rates for packaging in the EU, to drive a truly circular economy.
The Digital Watermarks Initiative HolyGrail 2.0 as the next iteration of the initial HolyGrail project under the Ellen MacArthur Foundation (2016-2019) – is a pilot project to prove the viability of digital watermarking technologies for accurate sorting and consequently higher-quality recycling, as well as the business case at large scale.
Digital watermarks are imperceptible codes, the size of a postage stamp, covering the surface of a consumer goods packaging. They can carry a wide range of attributes such as manufacturer, SKU, type of plastics used and composition for multilayer objects, food vs. non-food usage, etc.
The aim is that once the packaging has entered into a waste sorting facility, the digital watermark can be detected and decoded by a standard high-resolution camera on the sorting line, which then – based on the transferred attributes – can sort the packaging into corresponding streams. This would result in better and more accurate sorting streams, and thus consequently in higher-quality recyclates, benefiting the complete packaging value chain.Next to this “digital recycling passport”, digital watermarks also have the potential to be used in other areas such as consumer engagement, supply chain visibility, and retail operations.
For more information on the initiative visit http://www.aim.be/priorities/digital-watermarks/
