BOTTLING / FILLING PETplanet Insider Vol. 24 No. 04/23 www.petpla.net 22 Climate-neutral juice factory European manufacturer Innocent Drinks, which is 90% owned by Coca-Cola, has opened a new bottling plant that will be 100% electrically operated and totally carbon neutral. It is fitted out with four Krones PET bottling lines and corresponding IT infrastructure. Drinks manufacturer Innocent Drinks’ new facility in the Port of Rotterdam, Netherlands, named “the blender”, is one of the world’s first carbon neutral factories. Krones has delivered and installed four speciallydesigned PET lines for it. Innocent, which is the European market leader for smoothies, has a healthy, sustainable and environmentally responsible image and aims to set an example in the food industry. Sam Woollett, Site Director of “the blender”, says that the business is aiming to be climate neutral by 2025 and the new plant will play a key role in reaching that target.” Innocent Drinks has made minimising its carbon footprint a primary goal. Its efforts were recognised in 2018, when it was officially certified as a B Corp – a private certification of for-profit companies for their “social and environmental performance” – demonstrating that a successful business can also be responsible. The company has used contract fillers for many years but decided to build its own filling plant in order to better manage the sustainability of its production. The blender, one of the first carbon neutral factories in the world, is equipped with a combination of technological innovations and clever designs, all in the interest of reducing emissions in every area of operations. The plant was built from sustainable, locally sourced materials and incorporates heat recovery and solar panels, will have its own wind turbines from 2024 and will then operate as a carbon neutral facility. A fleet of newly designed electric trucks transport bulk orange juice from a nearby storage facility to the factory. The location in the Port of Rotterdam was chosen deliberately; it helps Innocent to reduce the total mileage in its value chain by 20 percent, which also helps to reduces its emissions, Sam Woollett explained. As well as building an environmentally compatible facility, the company wanted to create a pleasant environment for the 200 employees on the site. The building has been designed to provide plenty of natural daylight, room to move around and space for working together, and a safe and inclusive company culture. Adaptable, quick changeover PET lines The four PET lines supplied by Krones are used primarily filling juices and smoothies. Innocent Drinks has left enough room in the plant to add a fifth line if needed. The main criteria for awarding the contracts for the greenfield project were: sustainability, including minimised consumption of operating supplies and water; safety and reliability of the equipment; and the quality of the product and its packaging. Innocent sells a wide range of different drinks in different sized bottles, made to very different recipes, so the systems have to be flexible and capable of producing high output volumes per hour but they also have to be easy to change over to another product or size. “Two to three different bottle formats and around ten different drinks are filled on each line,” says Sam Woollett. “That’s why we ultimately chose Krones. They offered the best solutions for our needs.” Production began in July 2022, after the four PET lines were delivered, installed and tested in early 2021. Although the lines are identical, they are currently filling at different output rates. One is operating at 22,000 containers per hour, a second at 27,000 and the other two operate at 32,000 containers per hour. The Contipure AseptBloc DA blow-moulder-filler block consists of a Contipure AseptBloc DA Innocent’s product range extends from orange juice to vitamin smoothies and ginger shots. Topmodul labeller KRONES Hall 13 Booth A73
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