Berry Global., partnered with Abel & Cole, a pioneer in sustainable food delivery, to supply bottles for its Club Zero Refillable Milk delivery service. The new polypropylene (PP) bottles can be refilled up to 16 times before being recycled.
Made with widely recyclable PP, the new bottles produce fewer transport and processing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions compared to heavier glass bottles,* challenging the conventional use of glass bottles for home milk delivery.
Research conducted by Abel & Cole suggests that reusing the Club Zero Refillable Milk bottles just four times reduces the carbon footprint of their single-use milk bottles by half compared to heavier glass bottles, which would take over 15 returns to reach similar emissions savings. At the same time, the concept saves 450,000 single-use plastic milk bottles from landfills or incineration per year, equivalent to 23 tonnes of plastic.
“When it comes to packaging materials, plastic is often seen as the enemy,” explained Hugo Lynch, Sustainability Lead at Abel & Cole. “But we challenged ourselves to ask if it was better to use glass, which is heavier and more energy-intensive to make, or to go against the grain.”
