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I need to report my packagings' weight and material type. How do I determine them?

You need to know your packagings' weight and material type, including all packaging components, to be able to correctly report your packaging volumes to your system operator and to the LUCID Packaging Register. 

1. Determining the material type
First, you need to check if the packaging is made of

  • mono-material such as glass, paper, plastics, tinplate or aluminium, or

  • a combination of different material types such as paper/plastics, paper/aluminium/plastics or different plastics.

Packaging consisting of different components that a consumer cannot separate by hand is composite packaging.

Where a component makes up less than 5% of the mass (e.g. tape on shipment packaging, <5% = paper/paperboard) it is classed as being part and parcel of the main material.

Where a packaging component accounts for more than 5% of the total weight and cannot be separated by hand, the packaging is classed as a composite. In this case, the material type depends on the packaged product.

  • Example: Fruit juice or ice tea in a beverage carton made of a carton-plastics-aluminium combination is classed as the 'beverage carton packaging' material type.
  • Example: Sieved tomatoes, custard sauce, rice pudding in a paper-aluminium-plastics carton is classed as the 'Other composite packaging' material type.

The general rule is as follows: all composites that do not contain beverages are 'Other composite packaging'.

2. Determining the weight

There are three ways to determine your packaging's weight:

  1. Your packaging supplier provides details about the weight of the individual packaging and additional packaging components you have sourced from them, as applicable. These details could be included on an invoice or delivery note, for example.

  2. The packaging supplier or manufacturer provides you with specifications that include weight details. Examples include a product data sheet for your packaging.

  3. You weight the empty packaging yourself.

    Heads-up: Estimating the packaging weight is not enough. That is why you should document verifiably how the weights you report have been determined.

3. Determining the total packaging quantities to be reported

To determine the packaging volumes, you will have to report to your system operator and the LUCID Packaging Register, please multiply ...

  • ... the individual packaging weight by the packaging units that you are planning on using during the reporting period. This is for submission of the planned packaging volume report or conclusion of a system participation agreement with a system operator.

    Heads-up: For planned volume reports, you are required to estimate the packaging volume you will place on the market in the following year by the end of the current year. This estimate is typically based on your revenue projections and the previous year's unit numbers, adjusted for factors such as new product launches, customer loss, anticipated revenue fluctuations and other relevant changes.

  • ... the number of actual units used (as recorded, for example, in your merchandise management system) by the packaging weights determined at the beginning of the year. This calculation is made after a given year has ended, and is to fulfil the regular requirement for year-end volume reporting.

Heads-up: You are required to determine these volumes for each of the packaging types you are using to hand over goods to customers.