Tetra Pak trials removing aluminium layer in bid to crack recyclability challenge

A customer takes milk in a Tetra Pak carton from the dairy department of a Carrefour grocery store in Brussels. REUTERS/Eric Vidal Acquire Licensing Rights

August 14 - The Swedish-Swiss drinks packaging giant Tetra Pak produced 193 billion of its ubiquitous cartons last year, but despite on-pack labels in many markets saying its packages are recyclable, globally only about a quarter of them were actually recycled, meaning that three in four ended up in landfill, incineration or washed up in the world’s waterways. Even in recycling king Europe, the recycling rate averaged only about 50%.

Raquel Noboa, chief executive of Irish environmental education consultancy Fifty Shades Greener, is one of many commentators who have been highly critical of Tetra Pak for failing to deliver on its recyclability claims. “The best thing we can do is avoid buying and disposing of Tetra Pak, where possible,” she advises.

Tetra Pak points out that its processing and packaging technology has made it possible to protect perishable foods without refrigeration and enable even remote corners of the world safe access to nutritious food. But it has struggled to lift stubbornly low recycling rates due to its packages’ multi-layered design, comprising paper, plastic and a thin layer of aluminium, which plays a critical food safety role.

In individual markets around the world, the company has had to work with governments and local partners to come up with solutions, and recently announced a joint investment with Stora Enso to triple the annual recycling capacity of beverage cartons in Poland, from 25,000 to 75,000 tonnes. In the UK, for example, where it worked with individual councils, retailers and recycling specialist Sonoco to establish a specialised recycling facility in Halifax, only 45% of the local authorities in the UK that collect Tetra Pak for recycling at kerbside send them to the facility, leaving it vastly under-utilised.

The company’s long-term plan is to develop an aseptic package that is fully renewable, recyclable and carbon-neutral. It has invested heavily in innovation by replacing plastic caps with biobased alternatives and recycled polymers and increasing levels of FSC-certified cardboard.

A recycling sign is seen at a supermarket in west London. Globally, only about a quarter of Tetra Pak cartons were recycled last year. REUTERS/Toby Melville Acquire Licensing Rights

But the layer of aluminium is the real sticking point when it comes to recyclability. That’s why it was a big breakthrough when news came that Tetra Pak had conducted trials swapping out the aluminium layer of its packaging for paper and was planning to begin testing the new aluminium-free packages in the field.

“Technology verification in the field is going to happen very soon, though I can’t disclose the market,” Davide Braghiroli, the firm’s director of packaging solutions, told The Ethical Corporation.

He said the innovation has been made primarily to reduce Tetra Pak’s carbon footprint. Despite being thinner than a human hair, it contributes around a third of the packages’ greenhouse gas emissions.

The company also believes that cartons with a higher paper content will also be more valuable for paper mills, since there will be a higher proportion of fibres for them to extract. The FSC-certified paper used in the new carton will be sourced from the same suppliers as the existing paper layer, but will be specially engineered as a barrier layer, Braghiroli says.

Research by Tetra Pak found that some 40% of consumers confirmed they would be more motivated to sort waste for recycling if packages were made entirely from paperboard and had no plastic or aluminium.

Asked her response to the latest innovation, Noboa commended Tetra Pak for efforts to make its packaging recyclable, but added: “Innovation needs to concentrate on creating reusables only and eliminating any single-use items so we can reduce waste, not increase recycling. Recycling itself has been proven as a system that is currently broken, increasing the recyclability of any packaging will not reduce the strain our human actions are putting on nature.”

Thomson Reuters

Terry Slavin is editor-in-chief of Reuters Events Sustainable Business, and edits The Sustainable Business Review and The Ethical Corporation magazines @tslavinm

Catherine Early is a freelance journalist specialising in the environment and sustainability. She writes for Business Green,China Dialogue and the ENDS Report, among others. She was a finalist in the Guardian’s International DevelopmentJournalism competition.