Major environmental savings have already been achieved through the lightweighting of plastic bottles
Bottled water companies have made considerable progress in reducing the amount of plastic used to package their products over the last few years. More recently, the use of recycled PET (RPET) back into plastic bottles has become technically feasible while the supply of food grade recycled plastic has improved. Bottled water firms are committed to minimising their carbon footprint and packaging waste through continued lightweighting and use of recycled PET.
In 2007, at a conference organised by WRAP under the title of Next Steps in PET bottle Lightweighting, the beverage industry heard about latest trends in the reduction of amount of plastic used in each bottle, and, of particular interest, what could be achieved if the entire industry adopted best practice techniques. Professor Edward Kosior, Managing Director of NEXTEK Pty Ltd and Adjunct Professor of Polymer Engineering and Recycling at Swinburne University in Melbourne, Australia, stated that lightweight PET bottles offer the drinks industry great potential for reducing raw materials, processing, distribution and energy costs.
According to Professor Kosior, in the last 10 years the average weight of a 50cl water bottle has almost halved, from around 23g to 12g. More PET tends to be used for packaging carbonated soft drinks than bottled water. Where a 50cl bottle of water uses 12g, a 60ml carbonated soft drink bottle would use 24g.
A 2005 survey commissioned by WRAP compared the weight of PET bottles used across the beverage industry, looking at best, common and worse practice. It found:
For a 50cl water bottle, the heaviest PET bottle on the market weighed 38.3g and the best 17.5g. Typical bottle weights were 17.5g and 23.5g, as many industry leaders are already using best practice in lightweighting.
For the equivalent-sized carbonated soft drink bottle, the worse bottle weighed 39.2g, whilst the best came in at 21.5g, and the most commonly used bottle weighed 28.1g.
For a 1 litre bottle of water, the best bottle in the market weighed 27.08g and the worse 37.5g. Typically, producers use a 36.4g bottle.
Based on these findings, WRAP concluded that 222,375 tonnes of packaging plastic (from a total of 756,472) could be saved in the UK if all food and beverage manufacturers switched to 'best in class' techniques. For bottled water, 3,468 tonnes could be saved from a total of 25,371 tonnes of packaging used in 2003.
Achievements in lightweighting
On a worldwide basis, Danone has achieved a 30% reduction in the average weight of its PET bottles over the last 15 years.
Nestlé has reduced the volume of packaging material used per litre of bottled water by 22% over the last 6 years, saving 257,000 tonnes of packaging material.
At Highland Spring, through the redesign of preforms, the company achieved a 2006 total saving of 4.85% over 2005 on PET usage, an average of 1.5g per bottle produced and over 341,000kg in total.
Brecon Carreg has reduced the weight of its preform for a 50cl bottle from 22g to 20g, saving 57 tonnes of PET for this one size in the course of a year.
At Abbey Well Natural Mineral Water, the 50cl plastic bottle has been reduced from 23g to 19g, and the label has been changed to plastic as a uniform pack is more readily recyclable.
In a research project with WRAP, Radnor Hills brought the weight down of its 50cl PET bottle for its carbonated water from 25g to 20g, a 20% saving in raw material use.
Recycled PET (RPET)
Alongside lightweighting, bottled water companies are leading the way with the use of recycled PET within primary packaging. This both saves on the use of virgin oil and reduces the carbon footprint of the bottle, as less carbon is emitted in the collection and reprocessing of plastic bottles compared to that expended in the processing of crude oil into PET. During 2008, the use of RPET will become widespread among two of the leading bottled water companies.
From January 2008 onwards, Danone shall progressively introduce recycled PET (at 25% recyclate) in its Evian 1 litre and 75cl water bottles, with 1.5 litre recycled PET introduced in April 2008. By the end of 2008, Danone’s aim is to commercialise all its 75cl, 1 litre and 1.5 litre bottles into RPET. According to Danone, RPET will allow the company to reduce the bottle's carbon footprint by 17% related to the packaging of a 1.5 litre bottle of Evian’s main product.
At Highland Spring, post consumer recycled PET was trialed in 2007 to evaluate the use of 25% recycled material mixed with virgin grade PET to produce PET bottles. This trial was successful and subsequently marketed, with 12.5 million bottles produced in this way during 2007. The organisation has increased its commitment to 25% recyclable PET significantly in 2008, with an estimated 50 million bottles of Highland Spring planned to be produced with 25% recycled content in this year.
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