Coca Cola Helps a Phoenix Rise From the Ashes



MD Jonathon Short shows off rPET raw product at Hemswell

One of the world‘s most famous brands is joining forces with a UK plastics firm to build a recycling facility. The deal has been described as a step change in plastic reprocessing and is a joint venture of Coca-Cola Enterprises Ltd (CCE) and ECO Plastics which will develop a facility in Lincolnshire, England that will more than double the amount of reprocessed PET (rPET) bottles in Great Britain.

While plastics are notoriously difficult to recycle, especially whem compounded, drinks bottles are a relatively easy and abundant commodity which has long been in need of investment to generate a recycling and re-use stream. Around 35,000 tonnes of PET bottles were reprocessed last year. The two companies said their project will increase this to more than 75,000 tonnes when fully operational. The high-quality rPET will be used for food-grade, sustainable packaging.

ECO's plant at Hemswell, Lincolnshire recently re-opened following a fire in 2009 which completely devastated the original facility, causing a plume of black smoke to become visible 30 miles from the site and was attended by 17 fire engines. "When we do something at AWS we pride ourselves on doing it properly and the fire was no exception," joked  then Chairman Peter Gangsted. With the new development the plant will be among the largest in Europe and is expected to be operational by mid 2012.

This is a first for the British drinks manufacturing industry and will begin to close a loop on PET use and re-use in the UK, since CCE currently sources its food-grade rPET from continental Europe. This plant will supply CCE with enough GB-sourced material to achieve its target of including 25% rPET in all its plastic packaging in GB by next year.

Simon Baldry, managing director of CCE GB, said: "Our investment in this project with ECO Plastics will start to address the recycling challenges in this country. British PET bottles will be recycled for re-use in packaging that will be sold from the shelves of British retailers... The amounts of high quality rPET produced in GB will more than double, enabling CCE to meet our ambitious target of incorporating 25% rPET in all our plastic bottles by 2012. At the same time, we are working with our customers to encourage shoppers to recycle more as part of our wider sustainability efforts."

The company has signed a l0-year joint venture deal with ECO Plastics that guarantees an annual supply of rPET. Coca-Cola Enterprises is making a 1/3 equity investment to support construction of the new £15m facility with ECO Plastics raising the balance.

Independent research has shown that products made with recycled plastic from the ECO Plastics site are 68% less carbon-intensive than packaging made with virgin materials.  By the middle of 2011 the management team expects the plant will be processing (140,000 tonnes) almost half of the UK's national plastics sorting capacity, equivalent to more than two billion bottles a year.