Winery Plastic Bottles to Cut Greenhouse Emissions
Australia-based Foster’s Group has decided to switch the packaging for its new “Green label” brand wines from glass to plastic. With this move, the company expects to cut greenhouse gas emissions over the life of the bottle by 29 percent.
Foster’s made a similar attempt in Canada in 2006, with customer resistance. So this time around, the company did a complete lifecycle analysis of the two packaging types. It also priced the wines to “appeal to environmentally conscious consumers.”
Fosters estimates its new plastic wine bottles will cut greenhouse emissions by 29 percent. Photo: BBC.co.uk
One reason for lower emissions is that PET plastic is considerably lighter than glass bottles, meaning transportation would have less of an eco-impact.
While glass bottles are generally rated higher for the ability to preserve flavor over time, Foster’s new releases have addressed this as the company states these wines have a shelf life of only 12 months.
In South Australia, glass bottle manufacturer O-I has invested $3.5 million (Australian dollars) to reduce the weight of its bottles by 28 percent. This is expected to save 200,000 tons of glass annually.
What has yet to be seen is how these packaging changes will affect sales outside of Australia. The amount of Australian wine imported to the U.S. has declined each year since 2007, an average drop of 18 percent each year.
As of June 17th 2011 we have upgraded our comment system to use Facebook comments. The below comments are closed and are listed for historical purposes.
James
posted on May 12th, 2009 at 10:29 am
That’s nice that it will help the company make money but with the studies coming back about plastics releasing chemicals into the foods and drinks that are stored in them I don’t think this is a good idea. Plus plastic and only be recycled so many times before being unusable while glass on the other hand can be recycled many times over. The better idea would be to make a lighter bottle like O-I did and push for more glass recycling.
Skeptical Optimist
posted on May 13th, 2009 at 11:26 am
Agreed that plastics can leak toxins – they need to find a better way! Why not tin or aluminum or steel? Lightweight, recyclable many times over and non-toxic.
AMo
posted on May 14th, 2009 at 1:13 am
what are they thinking?
J. Foster
posted on May 26th, 2009 at 6:57 am
Technically, plastic can be ‘downcycled’ and is not 100% recyclable. Glass on the other hand is chemically inert, does not leach chemicals into its product and is the only packaging material that can be infinitely recycled back into its original form.
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