Recycled polymers reinforce economy

SIG is once again lead­ing the indus­try on sus­tain­able inno­va­tion by being the first to offer bev­er­age car­tons made with recy­cled poly­mers pro­duced from post-con­sumer plas­tic waste.

SIG cus­tomers will be able to respond to con­sumer demand for pack­ag­ing made with recy­cled plas­tics by choos­ing SIG car­tons made with cer­ti­fied cir­cu­lar poly­mers. This inno­va­tion rein­forces SIG’s con­tri­bu­tion to the cir­cu­lar econ­o­my by mak­ing use of low qual­i­ty, mixed plas­tic waste that would oth­er­wise be incin­er­at­ed or sent to land­fill. The mixed plas­tic waste that is col­lect­ed is treat­ed in a process that enhances the mate­r­i­al and trans­forms it into a high-qual­i­ty food grade material.

Made pri­mar­i­ly from renew­able, FSC-cer­ti­fied paper board, SIG’s bev­er­age car­tons already sup­port the cir­cu­lar econ­o­my by pro­mot­ing the regen­er­a­tion of vital nat­ur­al resources in respon­si­bly-man­aged forests.

Ace Fung, Prod­uct Man­ag­er Sus­tain­abil­i­ty at SIG said: “Using post-con­sumer recy­cled poly­mers in our pack­ag­ing adds to our port­fo­lio of solu­tions to help cus­tomers respond to con­sumer demand for more sus­tain­able pack­ag­ing. This lat­est inno­va­tion demon­strates SIG’s com­mit­ment to a cir­cu­lar econ­o­my and to address envi­ron­men­tal con­cerns about plas­tic waste. This is anoth­er pos­i­tive strive for­ward for SIG and the car­ton pack­ag­ing industry.”

Pioneering partnership

SIG is among a select group of com­pa­nies – and the first in the bev­er­age car­ton indus­try – to part­ner in the foun­da­tion stage of devel­op­ment of recy­cled poly­mers from post-con­sumer waste by its sup­pli­er, Sabic. This pio­neer­ing part­ner­ship high­lights SIG’s com­mit­ment to a more sus­tain­able future through new solu­tions that sup­port a cir­cu­lar economy.

The recy­cled poly­mers offer the same high qual­i­ty and have the same prop­er­ties as poly­mers made entire­ly from vir­gin raw mate­ri­als. Any con­t­a­m­i­nants are elim­i­nat­ed dur­ing pro­cess­ing, mak­ing the recy­cled con­tent com­plete­ly safe for food packaging.

Frank Kui­jpers, Gen­er­al Man­ag­er Cor­po­rate Sus­tain­abil­i­ty at SABIC said: “Cer­ti­fied cir­cu­lar poly­mers from Sabic Tru­cir­cle ini­tia­tive will act as a bridge mov­ing from a lin­ear econ­o­my to a cir­cu­lar one and will enable the val­ue chain to become famil­iar with the prod­ucts and con­sid­er how they can best be imple­ment­ed in their own mar­kets. Our col­lab­o­ra­tion with SIG is a good exam­ple of how this pio­neer­ing prod­uct can be imple­ment­ed in the bev­er­age car­ton mar­ket for the first time and can help meet con­sumer demand for more sus­tain­able prod­ucts and will con­tribute to clos­ing the loop on reuti­liz­ing plas­tic waste.”

Certified circular polymers

The recy­cled poly­mers offered by SIG will be cer­ti­fied to the Iscc Plus stan­dard to enable cus­tomers to trace recy­cled con­tent through­out the val­ue chain from post-con­sumer waste streams to pro­cess­ing and use in the pro­duc­tion of new cartons.

SIG’s com­mit­ment to sourc­ing cer­ti­fied sus­tain­able mate­ri­als is part of its ambi­tion to go Way Beyond Good by putting more into the envi­ron­ment and soci­ety than it takes out.