Greiner Packaging Promotes the Use of Alternative Raw Materials, such as R-PET or PLA

The Austrian packaging producer Greiner Packaging promotes the use of alternative raw materials, such as R-PET or PLA. For the further development of production technology, sustainability is an equally important factor as investment in infrastructure.

26 Nov 2010 --- The megatrend sustainability has an influence on corporate liability with regard to society, economy and environment. “For us, acting sustainably is not a novelty, yet people’s sensitivity to this topic has reached an all time high within the last few years. Since its foundation in 1960, Greiner Packaging has been acting and taking its decisions with sustainability in mind”, says Robert Obermayr, Product Group Director. At present, the focus of the most discussed topics in this area is on renewable raw materials, CO2 reduction and recycling.

Sustainable raw materials
The processing of sustainable raw materials provides interesting potential for the plastics industry. Greiner Packaging is intensively working on employing alternative materials, such as plastics filled with chalk or talcum, foamed plastics or bioplastics such as PLA (Polyactid) or lignin. Within the last few years, R-PET (Recycling-PET) has gained massively in importance. This material saves resources and helps economising on energy during manufacturing processes, whilst reducing CO2 emissions at the same time. It has its origin in PET bottles which have been integrated in the “sorted plastics circuit”. Greiner Packaging processes R-PET at all existing PS plants at different production locations and so it is capable of implementing an array of packaging solutions.

Sustainable products
The K3 packaging technology was developed by Greiner Packaging and is characterised by two ecological advantages: It reduces the proportion of plastic in the packaging as a whole. In addition, for the production of the cardboard sleeve, environmentally-friendly resources, such as recycled cardboard and cardboard made from virgin fibres are used. A further development of K3 is K3-E. This form of packagaging captivates through its extremely low net weight, which makes it highly energy-efficient.

Sustainable infrastructure
For many years at Greiner Packaging, investment in infrastructure has been marked by sustainability. For instance, waste heat from the production facility in Diepoldsau (Switzerland) is used for heating the ground of a neighbouring asparagus field. Here, asparagus grows better and is harvested earlier than usual. In this region it can be consumed at a time, where normally it would have to be imported, giving rise to high transportation costs. Before and after the asparagus growing period, the waste heat is supplied to the community in the form of district heating. In the Northern Irish town of Dungannon, Greiner Packaging established a modern high-bay warehouse replacing four smaller warehouses. Much transport is saved as a result and the CO2 emissions are massively reduced. For energy-saving measures at the Austrian locations in Kremsmünster and Wartberg, Greiner Packaging received the award “energieeffiziente betriebe” within the framework of the klima:aktiv programme.