Styrenic polymers are used in a wide range of products that are valuable to our everyday lives. From packaging, appliances and electronics to medical equipment, construction and automotive, styrenics applications offer unique characteristics to a broad range of industries, while employing millions of people across Europe. The value of styrenics for the European economy and society has been recently assessed by a comprehensive study1 carried out by Wood Consulting.

Drawing on literature and statistical sources, the study highlights the wide-ranging socio-economic benefits of the styrenics industry and its downstream value chain. Such benefits are generated from turnover, value-added and jobs. More specifically, findings reveal that the styrenics polymer industry employs over 60,500 employees in Europe, taking into account both producers and converters, and generates billions of turnover every year. Given their multiple and various applications, Wood has found that the use of styrenic polymers in products creates socio-economic value far beyond the direct impact created by the industry itself.

In addition to supporting the EU economy, styrenic polymers provide unique and fundamental performance characteristics to products, contributing to enhancing their sustainability, durability, recyclability and affordability. More specifically, the study illustrates that styrenic polymers enable the creation of low-weight products and packaging, thus allowing for energy and GHG emission savings during both the production and transportation phases. It also highlights their unmatched characteristics in food packaging, where they offer a safe and affordable solution to keep food fresh and hygienic, ensuring consumer safety while contributing to food waste reduction. Furthermore, the study confirms that styrenics-based packaging has a valuable life-cycle environmental performance, exceeding other packaging materials due to its excellent circularity capacity and durability. Indeed, styrenic polymers are easy to sort and do not degrade in multiple recycling steps, making styrenics-based packaging recyclable over and over again without loss of quality or value of the material. 

The study also illustrates that styrenic polymers have enabled innovation both within the sector and in the applications in which they are used, fostering advancements in recycling technologies and improvements in material properties, contributing to the reduction of the environmental footprint of products. 

Do you want to know more about the socio-economic benefits of styrenics? Do not hesitate to contact us at info@styrenics.org


1 Wood Group UK Limited, Socio-economic analysis of styrene-based food contact materials, commissioned by Plastics Europe, December 2021. Report available upon request