New UK cross - industry group The Black Plastic Packaging Industry Group , which groups manufacturers , packers , brands , retailers , reprocessors , trade associations , and non - profit organisation RECOUP , has come up with recycling roadmap with the aim of recycling more black plastic in the UK . The group is made up of members from packaging manufacturers, packers, brands and retailers to material reprocessors, trade associations and individual specialists. Black plastic is hard to recycle because it is coloured using a black plastic , which absorbs infra - red light . This means that the packs are not detected , and hence not sorted , by optical sorting systems using the near infrared - red ( NIR ) detection used widely in sorting facilities .
New UK cross - industry group The Black Plastic Packaging Industry Group , which groups manufacturers , packers , brands , retailers , reprocessors , trade associations , and non - profit organisation RECOUP , has come up with recycling roadmap with the aim of recycling more black plastic in the UK . Black plastic is hard to recycle because it is coloured using a black plastic , which absorbs infra - red light . This means that the packs are not detected , and hence not sorted , by optical sorting systems using the near infrared - red ( NIR ) detection used widely in sorting facilities .