PETpla.net Insider 10 / 2020

BOTTLING / FILLING PETplanet Insider Vol. 21 No. 10/20 www.petpla.net 43 half of the year. Sales of Coke Classic rose by 11.4% in 2-litre and 3.6% in 600ml bottles; Mount Franklin 600ml bottled water sales grew four per cent. New products with reduced sugar content recently added to the portfolio include: Rekorderlig Cider Botanicals (an alcoholic ready-to-drink product available in various flavours); Pow- erade Active Water; and Nutriboost dairy drinks. Sustainable packaging The use of virgin PET is being reduced and replaced by recycled material in the production process. At the end of 2019 Amatil announced that it would be making seven out of 10 of its single-serve bottles in Aus- tralia from 100% rPET. This amounts to around 18,000 t/a of material. “In response to the high global demand for rPET, we joined forces at the end of last year with Veolia, the environmental service provider, to explore the possibility and viability of establishing a recycling plant for rPET in Australia”, Mr Chalmers said. Veolia is a global company that provides and maintains water, wastewater, energy and waste management services, as well as having waste management operations in 35 countries. “Amatil’s Packaging Services Division and our Futureworks team, responsible for developing sustain- able packaging, are currently explor- ing ways of using more rPET in the medium term,” he continued. Increased use of rPET depends on its availability. “We are definitely seeing trends towards the increased use of recycled material as well as increased demand for PET recycling. This will have a long-term bearing on our pack- aging work in the pre- and post-con- sumer market.” Amatil recently received two prizes at the 2020 Australian Pack- aging Innovation and Design Awards ceremony for its 100% rPET CSD bottle. It was awarded Best Austral- ian Sustainable Packaging Design and recognised for Packaging Inno- vation and Design in the ‘Beverage’ category. The company’s Eastern Creek, Sydney, plant has seen some changes since our previous visits, in the extent of automation especially. Robot cells have been incorporated into a fully- automated production process, erect- ing the Orbis style bulk bins (gaylords), inserting a plastic bag before filling with either preforms or closures and then, once filled, being sealed and labelled. The three-part SyLon Mercury Sports Cap, which was introduced in 2018 and made entirely from HDPE has been widely accepted in the market and proved to be particularly effective in difficult applications, such as nitro- dosed hot fill. The company continues the active development of caps and closure designs, so that it can be fully pre- pared for the introduction of new EU standards, such as tethered caps (which will be compulsory in the EU from 2024) if the Australian market decides to also enforce this type of packaging change. It already has cap designs that will meet the basic requirements. A number of measures have been taken at the Eastern Creek plant and throughout the Amatil group to protect employees, suppliers, customers and products from Covid-19, including com- prehensive hygiene plans and con- tact restrictions, both in B2B and B2C operations. Events and larger-scale gatherings have also been completely scaled back. www.ccamatil.com Mercury Line - Final part inspection via the IMD Vista inspection system