By Richard Higgs
Posted 9 February 2012
Leading European PET polymer producer La Seda de Barcelona has introduced a new ‘greener’ resin option to its product portfolio suitable for food and beverage packaging.
Artenius Elite, combining up to 50% post-consumer recycled PET with standard virgin PET raw materials, was developed by Barcelona, Spain-based LSB group’s Artenius PET resins division. This sustainable food-safe product is also “remarkably pure”, according to Artenius.
The new resin, currently produced at the group’s Artenius Italia plant in Italy, will soon also be manufactured at its Spanish plant in El Prat de Llobregat, Barcelona.
Decontamination challenge tests carried out by Fraunhofer Institute have found that the Artenius production process results in resins as pure as the 100% virgin resin, even under the worst case contamination scenarios, the company says.
“We have successfully created a PET packaging material that includes recycled resin in its manufacturing process, but with the same quality as virgin PET. The product development was a rigorous joint effort between R&D, our pilot plant, production sites and our in-house suppliers of recycled PET flakes,” recalled Jordi Foguet, Artenius’s technology manager.
The European Food Safety Agency (EFSA) has ruled that Artenius Elite’s process should not be treated differently from monomers manufactured by chemical synthesis. The process has also been approved by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) through its non-objection letter, said the company.There are nine different references of Artenius Elite resins available to meet various packing and moulding process needs. Depending on the base resin used, the product is suitable for processing as stretch blow moulding in one or two-stage processes, it stated.