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Pioneer in Bottle Recycling
If you pick up a PETCYCLE crate when you go shopping, you hardly notice that it is a pioneering system in the circular economy. This is because the beverage crate is part of everyday shopping in Germany.
The PETCYCLE bottles differ from the other bottles by, among other things, an octagonal or dodecagonal ring on the bottle neck and a reliable identification feature in the reverse vending machine.The figures speak for themselves: 26 billion bottles have now been filled in the PETCYCLE system and around 750,000 tons of carbon dioxide have been saved by using recyclate instead of new PET. The recycling rate has almost reached the 100 percent mark. When PETCYCLE developed the environmentally friendly process more than 25 years ago, recycling was still in its infancy.
“There was an intense debate about whether mineral water could be filled into PET bottles at all,” recalls Markus Wolff, CEO of the Deutsche Brunnen cooperative, the holding company to which the PETCYCLE shell company has belonged for four years.
Today, the intelligent hybrid system for SMEs works very simply and closes the gap between the two most widespread recycling methods: the one-way system, in which the PET bottles are only filled once and then end up compressed and shredded in the recycling stream, and the reusable system. With the latter, the bottles can be reused up to 25 times.
The Empties are Returned in the PETCYCLE Crates
A quarter of a century ago, PETCYCLE combined both ideas to create a new system. The principle works like this: Customers return the bottles sorted by type in the PETCYCLE crates. However, the empties are not refilled, but shredded into PET flakes, washed and prepared for food contact. New bottles are blown from the preforms in the oven. Although the PET bottles are only used once, as in the disposable system, they can theoretically be reused an infinite number of times in this bottle-to-bottle system. The advantage: the high-quality material does not end up abroad, nor is it incinerated or downcycled into packaging for cleaning products, cosmetics, or textiles. Fossil raw materials and greenhouse gases can thus be saved.
“The pioneering work consisted of relying on the existing structures in retail and beverage wholesaling, using the existing purchasing habits for drinks in crates and developing the PETCYCLE system from this – namely the PET recycling bottle with a returnable crate,” says Wolff. The calculation worked out, because Germans are among the world leaders in this area. 98 percent of them recycle their empties and thus benefit from the deposit system.
The PETCYCLE bottles are distinguished from the others by an eight- or twelve-sided ring on the neck of the bottle, a reliable identification feature in the reverse vending machine, and a black and green logo. The crates circulate an average of 100 times. The company thus achieves an exemplary eco-balance.
The reusable crate principle also reduces harmful environmental impacts, as many bottlers use the crates in the pool. Thanks to such networks, long transportation routes are eliminated. All this means that the PETCYCLE method does not leave a larger ecological footprint than reusable glass bottles.
Recycled Content Increases Continuously
PETCYCLE can look back on a real success story on its anniversary. “Over the years, PETCYCLE has succeeded in continuously increasing the return rate and the proportion of recycled material,” says Wolff. The material cycle is now almost closed with a return rate of 99.4 percent. Only a tiny fraction of PETCYCLE bottles end up as waste. And the recycling rate is now 80.9 percent on average.
51 mineral water bottlers now use this recycling system. “All users are medium-sized, regionally oriented brand companies, almost all of which rely on a packaging mix of PET and glass,” assures Wolff.
By Astrid Möslinger, freelance specialist journalist
