Under the arrangement, Britvic will trial the use of 10% recycled PET content in one million of its 500ml bottles of spring water Drench, which will be in shops from this month.
The recycled content for the bottles will be sourced from Closed Loop's Dagenham plant, which processes 35,000 tonnes of bottle waste each year to create food-contact grade recycled plastic for use in packaging.
The material will be sent to Britvic's preform bottle supplier Constar, based in Leeds, to produce the Drench bottles.
Commenting on the arrangement, Closed Loop Recycling's managing director, Chris Dow, said: “We are delighted to be working with Britvic, who, alongside an increasing number of other big brand owners and retailers, now understand the importance of producing more sustainable packaging here in the UK, something UK consumers are demanding.”
Leslie Davey, Britvic brands director, said: “It has always been our ambition to use British rPET to continue the brand's journey to continually improve our carbon footprint.
“We don't intend to stop here – both drench and Britvic will continue to look for ways to ensure sustainability remains a key consideration across the brand and the wider business.”
Other brands in the UK have trialled rPET in packaging, but have sourced recycled material from abroad, neutralising any environmental benefit through transport emissions.
In April 2009, Marks & Spencer unveiled an arrangement with Redcar-based plastics recycling firm Greenstar WES – which is owned by Greenstar UK – to supply recycled HDPE flake for the development of its range of organic milk bottles (see letsrecycle.com story).
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