The commitment continues to reduce CO2 emissions through the use of rPET material. This follows a June of 2020 announcement that Volvic achieved B Corp™ Certification and CO2 neutrality certification by The Carbon Trust as part of its sustainability efforts.
“Carbon neutral certification for the Volvic brand means that the lifecycle carbon footprints of its products have been transparently calculated and certified, and a carbon reduction plan is in place to ensure its emissions will be reduced,” says Dillon McEvoy, Danone Global Team. “To reduce its carbon footprint, Volvic has been continuously increasing the proportion of recycled materials in the bottles (in 2020 on average up to 30%), knowing that the use of rPET allows us to save up to 50% of carbon emissions versus a virgin plastic bottle. Since the certification, Volvic in Germany, Switzerland, and the USA switched to using 100% rPET across their entire portfolio, and small formats in France.”
Some brands seeking to switch to rPET have reported difficulties sourcing it. But as a Danone brand, long-term contracts for Volvic products have been secured with selected partners to deliver the volumes and quality needed to reach the commitment of 100% rPET across the entire Volvic portfolio by 2025, according to McEvoy. It also has been reported that bottle producers have to adapt to a material that behaves slightly differently than virgin PET, but Volvic has been able to overcome those challenges, too.
“About 90% of our preforms are produced at Volvic, and only 10% are produced externally by preform makers. The process is as follows: the injection workshop receives the granules from the rPET supplier, they dry it, and inject it into a press to make preforms. Then the preforms are blown and bottled on the bottling lines,” McEvoy says. “We face some changes in the injection process and we have to adapt temperatures and time of drying as well as the temperature and pression of injection. However, this is already the case when we use virgin PET from different suppliers. It is the job of the injection technician to adapt the process depending on the characteristics of the PET, virgin or recycled, according to what material is being used.”
Adds Olaf Zachert, CEO of BWR, “Volvic is a natural spring water—a pure force from nature. With the introduction of the rPET Volvic bottle, we are offering U.S. consumers the natural spring water paired with more sustainable packaging.”
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