RECYKAL TIMESIntelligence for the circular economyArchive search
Beverage makers are switching some products to PET bottles as aluminium can supplies tighten. Recykal Times’ internal price intelligence shows that bottle bale prices vary by state, while demand for new packaging does not automatically raise demand for recycled material.
On 15 October 2026, Loop Industries told investors it had shrunk the planned capacity of India's first large-scale PET depolymerisation plant from 70,000 to 45,000 tonnes a year, a 36% cut. Construction has not started. The company's board has formed a committee to weigh a sale. Mechanical recyclers are running ahead, but they cannot eat the coloured, contaminated PET that chemical recycling was supposed to handle. That waste stream just lost its most visible exit.
India's 2026 plastic rules now force brands to put 40% recycled content in rigid packaging this financial year, rising to 60% by 2028-29. That is a standing order to buy your recycled plastic. But the system meant to verify those claims, registered auditors and a CPCB guideline that was due around September 2026, has not fully arrived, which makes auditable, standard-grade recycled output the thing worth paying for.
From 2025-26, every city-gas company in India must blend compressed biogas (CBG) into the CNG and cooking gas it sells, starting at 1%, rising to 3% in 2026-27 and 5% by 2028-29. That demand is law, not hope. But only about 217 CBG plants are running against a target of 5,000, and the government's own reading is blunt: the thing holding CBG back is feedstock aggregation. Big money is now rushing in, Petronet LNG just put ₹1,200 crore into ten new plants, and every one of those plants will live or die on a steady supply of the crop residue, cattle dung, press mud and wet market waste that you handle. For once, the scarce link in the chain is not the buyer. It is the supplier.
On 15 October 2026, the country's largest PET recycler cleared its fourth food-grade recycled-PET line, part of a wave of capacity built to meet the rule that food and drink brands must use 40% recycled plastic in 2026-27. India now has about 17 FSSAI-approved food-grade rPET plants with roughly 3 lakh tonnes a year of capacity, heading towards an estimated 7.5 lakh tonnes by March 2027. But a food-grade plant cannot run on just any bottle. It needs clean, clear, well-sorted PET, and that is exactly the material the collection chain is worst at supplying. The bottleneck is no longer plants. It is feedstock.
Recorded ship traffic through the Strait of Hormuz is still a small fraction of what it was before the Iran war began on 28 February 2026. On 6 October 2026, only seven commodity vessels crossed, the fewest since 23 July, and attacks on tankers hit their highest weekly level of the war. In India the effects came in waves. Plastic raw material prices rose by half or more within weeks. The government waived import duty and then let the waiver lapse. Small plastic factories shut lines, and recycled plastic became more competitive on price. Recyclers say the gain is uneven, because brands are slow to buy and clean PET bottles are hard to find. This is how the story has run so far, and what it means for people who collect, sort and recycle.
September has closed, and each of our four material reports tells a different story. Copper went nowhere after a $750 swing, polymer prices rose round after round, lithium lost a quarter of its value, and Punjab's harvest season has begun. Here is the month in one page, with a link to the full report for your material.
Indian polymer makers revised prices on at least seven separate days in September, and Reliance and OPaL announced another increase for 1 October. At the same time, a film maker cut packaging film prices twice. Oil touched $104 before easing to about $99. Here is what the month's numbers say for converters, recyclers and collectors.
September changed the ground rules for India's scrap and recycling trade, from Brussels and Beijing to New Delhi and Punjab. Europe drew a line on metal scrap, India tightened its own import checks, oil above $100 made new plastic dearer, and a fixed biogas price gave straw a ten-year market. Here are the ten changes that matter most, ranked, with what each means and who it affects.
Reliance and IVL Dhunseri raised virgin PET prices by ₹2 a kg from 24 September 2026, with Brent crude above $100 a barrel. It lands at the halfway mark of the first year in which rigid plastic packaging must carry 40% recycled content. In May 2026, recyclers said a fifth or more of their food-grade capacity was idle, while an industry body representing beverage makers says supply falls short. Dearer virgin resin weakens the cost case for waiting and gives more bargaining power to whoever holds clean PET bottles.
A pipeline shutdown in Saudi Arabia is pushing up oil prices. This will hit your transport costs and could change the game for plastic scrap dealers.
India's rPET market stays steady as scrap sellers hold stock for post-monsoon demand. High ocean freight costs continue to stall export sales.
Big recycling plants are struggling to find enough clean bottles. This is a big shift for sellers, who can earn more for quality, and buyers, whose costs are rising.
A big company is boosting PET recycling in Thailand, which could mean changes for your plastic scrap.
A big plastics show in Hyderabad could change how your plastic scrap is used and valued.
Food-grade rPET commitments assume a bottle recovery rate the collection network does not currently deliver.