World’s first ‘paper beer bottle’ coming soon

The Carlsberg Group has unveiled two new prototypes of its Green Fibre Bottle. Fully recyclable and made from sustainably sourced wood fibres, only the inner barrier is made of a polymer film.

Danish brewer Carlsberg is one step closer to producing the world’s first ‘paper bottle’ for beer. According to a press release, it now has two prototypes of its Green Fibre Bottle. Both are made from sustainably sourced wood fibres and are fully recyclable. One prototype uses a thin recycled PET polymer film barrier to allow the bottle to contain beer, and the other has a 100% bio-based PEF polymer film barrier. Carlsberg’s ultimate goal is to produce a 100% bio-based bottle without polymers.

“While we are not completely there yet, the two prototypes are an important step towards realising our ultimate ambition of bringing this breakthrough to market,” said Myriam Shingleton, vice president of group development at Carlsberg Group. “Innovation takes time and we will continue to collaborate with leading experts in order to overcome remaining technical challenges.”

Carlsberg has been working on the Green Fibre Bottle project since 2015 together with innovation experts EcoXpac, packaging company BillerudKorsnäs and post-doctoral researchers from the Technical University of Denmark. Their combined efforts resulted in the emergence of Paboco, a paper bottle company. Carlsberg has now announced that The Coca-Cola Company, The Absolut Company and L’Oréal are coming on board to help advance sustainable packaging.

“We’re delighted that other like-minded companies have now joined us as part of Pabaco’s paper bottle community. Partnerships such as these, ones that are united by a desire to create sustainable innovations, are the best way to bring about real change,” Shingleton said.

Carlsberg has other packaging innovations under its belt, including recycled shrink film, greener label ink and the innovative Snap Pack, which replaces the plastic wrapping around its six-packs with a solution that instead glues the cans together.

Image credit: Carlsberg

 

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