BOTTLES, CAPS & CLOSURES: THE GREENBOTTLE
The industry is always looking for ways to improve its eco-credentials, be it through waste reduction, energy saving or sustainable practices.
A
man taking on this eco challenge is Martin Myerscough, inventor of
the GreenBottle. The Bottle, which is made from papier mache and has just ten per cent of the carbon footprint of a glass bottle, is expected to be rolled out in supermarkets early this year. Martin is already known for his innovative approack to work, having invented carboard bottles for milk, which can currently be found in supermarket Asda. According to Martin, 1.2 billion
glass wine bottles are used every year, so the GreenBottle allows very impressive carbon savings. The Bottle also, despite having a plastic liner to stop the wine soaking the material, can biodegrade on a compost heap within weeks. To find out more about the
Bottle as well as the man behind it, I caught up with Martin to discuss where his ideas have come from, what problems were come across in their execution and where else such a bottle could be used.
Q
Hi Martin. So where did the idea for paper-based
packaging for milk bottles come from? The original idea for GreenBottle came from a conversation I had with another member of our local rowing club in the pub. He mentioned that he ran our local tip and I asked him what the biggest problem he faced was in running the tip, and he replied that it was dealing with plastic bottle waste. This got me thinking and I did a bit of research, and saw that the stats for plastic bottle waste were just horrible, and I figured that in this day and age we must be able to do something better. At the same time my little boy came home with a mask he had made at school from papier mache, and this got me thinking even more! Paper is usually flat, but can also moulded into different shapes, and so the initial idea for GreenBottle was born.
Q
What initial planning stages were needed in
order to put the bottle together? The whole GreenBottle concept is based on zero trade offs - so
everyone using it - from the filling line to the supply chain, from the retail store to the end consumer, should not have to deal with any compromises when using GreenBottle. The aim was therefore to make GreenBottle conform as closely as possible to existing packaging, such as HDPE milk bottles. We had to therefore make sure that the bottle filled the same on existing filling lines, was exactly the same size as conventional bottles to make sure it fitted into the special dairy trolleys used to deliver milk, that it was robust enough for use in store, and that the consumer could use it in the home in the same way as a plastic bottle - so without having to make room for a special format in the fridge, and would be able to pour from the bottle easily. The other major point about GreenBottle is that it also doesn’t cost any more than existing packaging.
Q
What challenges did the company come across in
these initial stages? I think considering how the pulp moulded paper would need to perform was one of the biggest challenges - so initially we looked at egg cartons, also made from pulp moulded paper - but this was going to be too weak to survive in the supply chain and in the size of product needed, especially for a product like milk. We needed something that would be durable enough to cope with relatively extreme conditions, but that would still decompose easily when it came to disposal. The other key problem was
how we were going to actually make our product. The best of the current technology still had limitations in its ability to produce the sort of industrial quantities needed by potential customers, cost too much per unit to be produced, and simply wasn’t green, with carbon footprints higher than the plastic bottles we were looking to replace. We realised that we would need
to develop our own processes and machinery in order to create GreenBottle in a way that we felt would really work.
Q
When the prototype was first being tested, what
issues arose? Probably our biggest step forward was finding a pulp moulding technology that could guarantee a product with the
FMCGNews.co.uk | FMCG News | 31
“The aim was to make GreenBottle conform as closely as possible to existing packaging, such as HDPE milk bottles. We had to therefore make sure that the bottle filled the same on existing filling lines, was exactly the same size as conventional bottles, that it was robust enough for use in store, and that the consumer could use it in the home in the same way as a plastic bottle”
correct dimensional tolerances and appearance. These have been achieved using ‘dry in mould’ technology which produces a high quality repeatable product. This was allied to some detailed work with paper additive companies whose products allowed us to establish and maintain the necessary mechanical properties for filling, distribution and end use. We have now developed our
own technology to produce quality, tough shells at much lower cost. The design of the bottle has
also changed quite radically since its first inception as we developed a better understanding of all of the mechanical forces the bottle was subjected to which included not only things like top load but line pressure experienced during accumulation on filling lines. Each version of the bottle has taught us something new in terms of how to make GreenBottle really successful, so
conversation at the pub and his young son
The idea for Martin’s inventions came from humble beginnings - a
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