Coca-Cola European Partners inks deal to purchase 100% recycled PET

The soft drinks giant expects to be using Loop rPET in its product packaging by 2020. Loop provides enhanced recycling technology that makes available news sources of high quality rPET which previously could not be used due to colorant or other recyclability barriers.

CCEP chief supply chain officer Ron Lewis said the investment directly supports the company’s This is Forward sustainability plan.

“As part of This is Forward, we’ve committed to ensuring that at least 50% of the material we use for our PET bottles comes from recycled plastic by 2025,” he said. “This is part of a holistic strategy focused on creating a more circular packaging economy.”

Recycled salad packs

The news comes in the same week that Food to Go chain Chop’d announced that it will launch its salad range in 100% rPET from January 2019.

Chop’d claims to be the first major London brand to fully commit to 100% recycled packaging, along with an embossed lid. The company’s managing director Eddie Holmes vowed that Chop’d would help to educate consumers in the recyclability of the plastic used.

Holmes said: “We need to be truly responsible and by using 100% recycled PET the consumer can choose to recycle the plastic in the correct streams, ensuring that the packaging is recycled again and again.

“With our ‘create your own salads’, we provide the vegetables for free if you don’t take a bag. We started this from day one of trading, 14 years ago, and estimate that 50% of customers didn’t take a bag last year, which saved 500k bags, thereby really making a difference from an environmental perspective.”

George Ogleby