CAPS & CLOSURES 26 PETplanet Insider Vol. 26 No. 01+02/25 www.petpla.net Improving performance, enhancing sustainability PET closures for 1881 and beyond The Origin PET 1881 closure by Origin Materials introduces a versatile platform for producing rPET and PET closures, including tethered formats, across various industries. PET is not only the most recycled plastic in the world, today’s plastic recycling infrastructure is designed predominantly for PET. Closures made from PET could be transformative for packaging by designing for recycling circularity and improving the performance and sustainability of packaging. PET unlocks new design space Within the packaging industry there is strong and growing demand for solutions offering superior performance and sustainability characteristics. This is especially true for products designed for circularity, enabling the re-use and recycling of materials, as opposed to waste and downcycling. Many food and beverage companies are committed to improving recycling, expanding the use of recycled PET, and improving the performance characteristics of their products while delivering an excellent consumer experience. Origin PET closures are claimed to introduce important advantages for delivering on these goals. PET offers excellent barrier properties. Compared with other materials, this can result in less plastic needed to achieve equivalent or better performance. This can allow Origin to produce caps that can extend product shelf life, or produce the lightest caps of their kind, depending on the parameters optimised. Origin PET cap manufacturing does not require custom polymer, rather simply off-the shelf virgin or recycled PET, or blends thereof, depending on customer preference. For aesthetics and consumer experience, Origin PET caps provide a fully transparent closure to enhance product visibility. The closures allow brands to tint, print, or emboss the closure for enhanced marketing. For tamper evidence, the company’s PET cap is designed to provide a satisfying user experience, from its feel to the sound it makes when opened. The weight of the initial 1881 cap (1.5-1.8 g) is comparable or lighter than many HDPE or polypropylene caps on the market today. The light weight is afforded by the design space created by PET, with its good barrier properties - an estimated 40 times the carbon dioxide barrier, and 30 times the oxygen barrier of a similar thickness of HDPE - enabling new designs. Better recycling with non-modified mono-materials Mono-material products are made with one type of material. They are typically easier to recycle than products made from multiple materials and are highly desirable for packaging to improve recycling. For PET caps where the polymer is not modified, there is no need to separate caps from bottles during the recycling process to maintain the purity of the recycling stream, as there is with containers whose caps and bottles are made of different materials. This feature could be especially valuable for tethered cap solutions. In May 2024, Origin announced a tethered PET cap, which could become the first mass produced tethered PET closure. Many beverage brands today make claims related to recyclability and use of recycled content but often must include caveats related to caps and labels. With PET closures, the use of 100% recycled content from cap to bottom becomes possible. Manufacturing system In September 2024, the company unveiled the Origin CapFormer System, its commercial-scale manufacturing system for the production of PET caps and closures, and announced the completion of its successful factory acceptance test. “Through the novel application of thermoforming, slit-andfold technology, and proprietary design elements we have unlocked the ability CAPS & CLOSURES Origin PET 28mm 1881 showing knurls
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