Closing the Packaging Loop with Post-consumer Recycled PET

The Challenge

PET is a popular material choice for food and beverage packaging, affording high clarity with design flexibility. Additionally, it can be easily recycled multiple times unlike alternative packaging materials. Additives are often included in PET packaging to help protect contents and extend shelf life, but they can decrease packaging clarity. This in turn affects consumer perceptions of product appearance and brand value.

To support the shift toward a circular economy, governments are legislating increased levels of recycled material in single-use packaging. For example, an EU directive for use of recycled PET (rPET) in beverage bottles will increase from 25 percent in 2025 to 30 percent in 2030. As a result, brand owners want to ensure the oxygen scavengers used in their PET bottles maintain efficacy with increasing levels of rPET.

The Solution

ColorMatrix™ Amosorb™ 4020G is a non-nylon based, low-haze oxygen scavenger for polyethylene terephthalate (PET) rigid packaging. The new 4020G grade offers up to 50 percent lower haze and reduced impact on the PET recycle stream compared to previous grades, while maintaining the same reliable active oxygen scavenging performance.

The Impact

Avient’s solution provides our customers with the robust barrier properties required for PET rigid containers, but with negligible effects on efficacy for rPET. This solution improves the viability of rPET by reducing haze and reducing yellowing by 50 percent during the mechanical recycling process.