The foil top on a plastic pot or container does not belong to any of the material streams mentioned above. It comes under one of the two foil streams, or the 'small aluminium' stream if it is made from pure aluminium.
However, some of the tops on these items are not recyclable. If they are made from different materials that cannot be separated, they should go into residual waste. One example is a yoghurt pot with a top made from a mixture of plastic and paper. Fost Plus is making efforts to ensure that all packaging is recyclable, so sealed tops of this type will disappear.
So how are these trays and sealing films or foil tops separated at the sorting centre? Films and foils are separated from the rest of the PMD by wind sifters that remove the films and foils using suction, while plastic pots and containers are separated by optical separators. If the film is still attached to a tray, it will not be separated by the wind sifters, because they can only pick up very light plastic items.
