Aptar and Ecover launch dispensing closure made of post-consumer recycled resin

14 Feb 2019 --- Aptar Beauty + Home has launched its first dispensing closure made from 50 percent post-consumer recycled resin (PCR) in Europe. The closure was developed in collaboration with Ecover and will feature on the eco cleaning products brand’s washing up liquid. Both companies are seeking to continue exploring opportunities to roll out PCR within the wider Ecover product portfolio.  

Ecover's launch of the new custom flip-top closure is one of the first forays of a major brand in using PCR resin in its bottles and dispensing closures. Aptar’s comprehensive record in testing sustainable resins and knowledge of sustainable resin suppliers was key to Ecover’s decision to collaborate, says the company. 

"The resin that we mostly use for our dispensing closures today is Polypropylene. The main challenges today for PCR resin in PP are the following: A high availability of resin, PCR supplier location, technical requirements such as hinge performance, smell and regulatory (food contact compliance). Another challenge today for PCR in PP resin is regarding the color variation, color matching to chip and color repeatability order to order. We understand these challenges and we inform the customers accordingly so that together we always find the best solution to match their needs,” an Aptar spokesperson tells PackagingInsights.

The custom-made flip-top PCR closure on Ecover Washing Up Liquid allows consumers to stand the bottle upside down towards the end of product life to ensure they get every drop out of the bottle, the company describes.

Aptar has ample experience developing closures across market categories, including food and beverage. Last year, Aptar Food + Beverage collaborated with the creators of the Karma Push Cap Technology, Karma, to deliver instant-mix technology to a range of market segments focused on the rising trend of personalized and fortified nutrition. The collaboration believes that the cap has the potential to extend beyond beverages and into other industries, including medical and pharmaceutical.  

Made of recyclable and US FDA compliant materials, the Karma Push Cap is a delivery system that facilitates portion control and the ability to separate ingredients that are otherwise not shelf-stable.

A sustainable turn for household product packaging
As the demand for sustainability sweeps the packaging industry, items in the household department are certainly not exempt. 

A big step forward in increasing the recyclability of Opaque and Difficult to Recycle (ODR) Household and Personal Care (HPC) PET bottles was announced for the first time on February 7, 2019, at Petcore’s Conference in Brussels by P&G. 

Bottles in this market category with perforated sleeves, which allow consumers to tear off the sleeve and dispose of it at home, have received conditional European PET Bottle Platform (EPBP) approval. This means that the regulatory body will endorse the full body sleeve design for a period of up to three years. This is a significant solution to the growing ODR market, according to the company, and significant for the laundry care market that uses a large array of full body sleeved packaging designs.

In October 2018, Henkel announced that it had teamed up with social enterprise Plastic Bank a year prior to collect waste before it enters the oceans and to recycle post-consumer waste and integrate it into packaging. At collection centers in Haiti, the local population return collected plastic waste and exchanged it for money, goods, or services. The so-called “Social Plastic” is then integrated back into the plastic value chain and into packaging for household products. Experts from Laundry & Home Care’s packaging development department successfully integrated the recycled plastic in 25,000 bottles for laundry and cleaning products. 

“There are less challenges than we thought at the beginning, regarding R&D in using the social plastics,” Thomas Müller-Kirschbaum, Head of Global Research and Development in Henkel’s Laundry & Home Care tells PackagingInsights.

“One of the reasons is that social plastic is generally very close to other post-consumer plastics. But there are of course other challenges that are remaining; mainly in the cleaning process of the collected plastic. Hence, the research we are conducting together with our technology partners focusses on a more efficient process to benefit from the scalability of the model,” he concludes. 

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