Kraft Heinz pilots recycled plastic packaging for roofs

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Dive Short:

  • Kraft Heinz has put in new roofs manufactured of recycled plastic packaging on producing amenities in Beaver Dam, Wisconsin, and Holland, Michigan.
  • The food items processing giant put in the recycled roofing boards in late 2020 and will watch the recycled material’s efficiency versus conventional constructing components with an eye to standardizing its use if the test goes effectively.
  • The recycled roof boards are 4 ft by 8 feet, and 94% of each board is designed from put up-shopper plastic and fiber. The organization did not show how considerably of its factories’ roofs have been lined in the recycled boards, but it can be absolutely getting place to the exam. Beaver Dam saw a foot of snow in February, even though Holland received far more than 2 ft, according to details from the Nationwide Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Dive Insight:

If this test will work and the recycled product is as fantastic as the conventional roofing, it could be a activity changer for Kraft Heinz. It is really not clear how substantially flexible packaging the CPG business makes use of for its merchandise each year. In accordance to studies on Kraft Heinz’s web-site, about 30% of its packaging as of 2019 fell into the non-recyclable group, which include flexible plastic films or rigid plastic containers.

The enterprise has quite a few sustainability targets, which includes earning 100% recyclable, reusable or compostable packaging by 2025. To arrive at that aim, the brand name is screening a recyclable and compostable paper cup for Macaroni & Cheese in the U.S., and in Europe strategies to make its Heinz Ketchup bottles with recyclable food-grade PET plastic.

As suppliers are working to reuse their squander items — each by means of upcycled solutions that save food stuff objects from the trash and manufacturing procedures that use squander for vitality — a thriving check consequence could place Kraft Heinz in a course of its have. The organization could potentially renovate its factories with its possess submit-consumer squander, which would be impactful. According to Kraft Heinz’s yearly report, it has 81 production services worldwide and owns all but three.

Kraft Heinz’s pilot venture will be a long lasting evidence of thought for applying recycled plastic as roofing content in industrial structures. It may perhaps enable popularize this reuse of plastic packaging, as properly as lead to advancements in the strength, weatherproofing and longevity of this roofing substance. As of 2018, 46% of recycled plastic movie ends up as this type of lumber, according to a report organized for the American Chemistry Foundation. The biggest trouble remaining unsolved may well be how to get individuals to transform their behavior and recycle more adaptable plastic — a little something that currently comes about only at fall-off bins positioned exterior shops.