Speaking at the Resource Recovery Summit, Marius Costache, CEO of GreenTech, highlighted the critical role of innovation and public policy in the development of Romania\u2019s recycling industry, pointing to over two decades of continuous investment and technological progress.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe have been innovating, I could say, since the beginning of 2001. There were not many players in the market at that time. When it comes to PET recycling, I believe we were among the first,\u201d Costache said. \u201cSince then and up to today, we have reached over 200 million euros in investments, not only in Romania and not only in Buz\u0103u.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He emphasized that regulatory support has been essential for the sector\u2019s growth, noting that major systems such as RetuRO and OIREPs would not exist without strong policymaking.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWithout policymaking, we would not be here today. If we didn\u2019t have policymaking, RetuRO wouldn\u2019t exist. If we didn\u2019t have policymaking, OIREPs wouldn\u2019t exist,\u201d he said. \u201cVery often, technology has moved ahead of policymaking and legislation. Each time, innovation has been influenced by what happens in the legislative area. It is very difficult for any company to innovate without legislative support\u2014it is almost impossible to succeed.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Costache also pointed to recent technological advancements developed by the company through European collaboration.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cFor the past two years, we have been part of a European project where we developed a technology that detects batteries in electronic equipment,\u201d he explained. \u201cThis is a major issue for electronics recyclers, as more and more devices contain batteries that are not easy to detect. We already have a functional project in Buz\u0103u for over a year.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Looking at the broader picture, Costache underlined that the value of the circular economy should not be measured strictly through immediate costs or product pricing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIt is quite difficult to see the effects of the circular economy directly in the price of a product or packaging,\u201d he said. \u201cIf we look strictly at costs or revenues, the battle for the circular economy is already lost.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIn my view, the circular economy represents access to materials for recyclers and those involved in this sector,\u201d he added. \u201cIt means being able to transform waste into resources at the lowest possible cost.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Speaking at the Resource Recovery Summit, Marius Costache, CEO of GreenTech, highlighted the critical role of innovation and public policy in the development of Romania\u2019s recycling industry, pointing to over two decades of continuous investment and technological progress. \u201cWe have been innovating, I could say, since the beginning of 2001. There were not many players […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":4471,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,8],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-4993","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-circular_economy","8":"category-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sustainability-today.ro\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4993","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sustainability-today.ro\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sustainability-today.ro\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sustainability-today.ro\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sustainability-today.ro\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4993"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.sustainability-today.ro\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4993\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4996,"href":"https:\/\/www.sustainability-today.ro\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4993\/revisions\/4996"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sustainability-today.ro\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4471"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sustainability-today.ro\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4993"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sustainability-today.ro\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4993"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sustainability-today.ro\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4993"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}