Sweden enlists Emballator for feasibility study on plastic industry’s environmental progress
18 Jan 2022 --- The Swedish government has granted funding approval for a feasibility study into the plastics industry’s environmental sustainability development in Jönköping County – the most plastic-dense area in Northern Europe.
Packaging group Emballator, which specializes in environmentally sustainable products, has been selected to participate in the project’s steering committee.
Mats Jeppsson, innovation manager at Emballator, tells PackagingInsights the study will seek to improve the region’s environmental footprint by increasing competition among smaller plastics businesses.
“There is a long history of entrepreneurship in Jönköping County, with many small and medium-sized companies. There are many subcontractors to the automotive industry and other industries, such as converters in both flexible and rigid packaging, that have started in the region.”
“The [study] aim is to increase the competitiveness of small and middle-size companies.”
The feasibility study will look to boost competition in the most plastic-dense area of Northern Europe.Bringing rivals together
The feasibility study will assess the region’s industry capacity to unite on producing more environmentally sustainable materials – even where profits may in some cases suffer. Boosting the chances for smaller businesses with less polluting innovations will require a show of collaboration among rivals.
“Coordination is a necessity for jointly managing transformation and innovation to a more [environmentally] sustainable production to maintain and increase the companies’ competitiveness,” Sweden’s Chamber of Commerce writes in a press release.
Jeppsson explains that the steering committee and research will address what material transformations are possible and what is needed to realize them.
“Firstly, the aim is to investigate the interest in coordinating logistics flows of raw materials, partly to investigate which new environmentally friendly materials may be of interest, and partly to identify the competence needs that exist and that need to be addressed to increase the development toward more [environmentally] sustainable production,” he says.
“The ideal outcome is to get as many companies as possible behind the actions from this feasibility study.”
Case study for global industry 
Improving competition recquires collaboration between rival companies.The project begins this month and will last until September 2022. Jeppsson says that while he does not know exactly what Emballators role in the steering committee will be, the region is the perfect place to study for industry development.
“Jönköping county has a diverse spread of plastic producing companies to many different industries. Here, everyone will have the possibility to learn more from each other and gain new knowledge for their respective business.”
“Emballator, like many other companies, takes great personal responsibility for reducing the climate impact on its products and services, but it is through dialogue and collaboration with others that we can build on each other’s ideas and initiatives to really have an impact on reduced CO2 emissions,” he says.
Sweden and Emballator
The project joins a host of other recent developments in Sweden as the country attempts to become a global recycling leader. Last year, Swedish Plastic Recycling (Svensk Plaståtervinning) announced it would be investing SEK 1 billion (US$116 million) in “the world’s largest” plastic recycling facility, named Site Zero
Emballator last year began testing the use of bio-based microfibers from poultry feathers for packaging applications. In collaboration with Bioextrax, a bio-extraction specialist company, the partners are assessing commercialization potential.
By Louis Gore-Langton
