Cologne/Nuremberg, September 25, 2024. Nestlé Germany, DUO PLAST and Der Grüne Punkt jointly received the German Packaging Award at the FACHPACK trade fair in Nuremberg. The three companies have developed new stretch hoods that contain up to 20 percent Systalen^® LDPE recyclate from the German Yellow Bag or Yellow Bin. This is the first time that post-consumer recyclates (PCR) from household collections have been used in such a sophisticated product.

The three partners received a German Packaging Award in the category of logistics and material flow for this innovative product. “I am very proud of this prestigious award because it shows once again how important and fruitful cooperation along the value chain is,” says Andreas Kappel, Head of Business Development at Der Grüne Punkt. “When everyone pulls together, groundbreaking innovations can be developed and brought to market.”

“It is worth highlighting that the total share of PCR is 30% and the share of readily available material from the Yellow Bag is 13.2% on average – with the expectation that this will increase,” writes the jury. Nestlé Germany had tested the stretch hood on various product pallets in real-life operations. No quality disadvantage compared to conventional stretch hoods could be determined.

There is great potential for the use of recycled materials in stretch hoods, because they are becoming increasingly popular for securing pallets during transportation. Using recycled materials helps protect the climate: every kilogram of Systalen^® LDPE that replaces new plastic saves the emission of approximately half a kilogram of climate-damaging greenhouse gases (measured in CO₂ equivalents).

Caption: Thomas Reiner, Chairman of the Board of the German Packaging Institute (center), handed the German Packaging Award to (from left): Dirk Willy Haase, Nestlé Germany, Thorsten Weber, Der Grüne Punkt, Mika Sang, DUO PLAST, Andreas Kappel, Der Grüne Punkt. (Image: Der Grüne Punkt)