Opportunity profile: Plastics scheme packs a punch

UKRI hopes to reinvigorate research into sustainable plastic consumer packaging with a £8 million call

UK Research and Innovation’s Enabling Research in Smart Sustainable Plastic Packaging call has up to £8 million available for projects investigating plastic packaging for consumer products.

The call, which is part of the Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund’s wider Smart Sustainable Plastic Challenge, is being managed by the Natural Environment Research Agency, but not limited to bids the focus of which falls within that agency’s remit. Suggested grant topics include but are not limited to: behavioural insights on consumers and business, supply chain and business and economic models, new plastic packaging designs, new recyclable materials, recycling technologies and processes, and environmental impacts of existing and new plastics.