Japanese brewer and distiller Suntory Group is set to introduce polyethylene terephthalate (PET) bottles produced using paraxylene derived from used cooking oil (UCO) for select products.
Starting this month, the material would be used in approximately 45M PET bottles and there were plans to expand its use across its product portfolio, the company said on 28 October.
PET resin, the raw material for PET bottles, comprises 30% monoethylene glycol (MEG) and 70% terephthalic acid (TPA).
Although Suntory has been using plant-derived materials for MEG in its Suntory Tennensui brand PET bottles since 2013, the company said the use of paraxylene derived from UCO meant it could produce TPA at commercial scale.
As part of the initiative, the group set up a global supply chain in collaboration with corporations such as ENEOS Corporation and Mitsubishi Corporation to source bio-naphtha derived from UCO to produce PET bottles.
Bio-naphtha can be produced from the manufacturing process of sustainable aviation fuel (SAF), among other things, and as SAF production is expected to increase, the importance of developing a bio-naphtha supply chain is also growing, according to the company.
Suntory said it planned to build a more robust mass production system for bio-based PET bottles in cooperation with stakeholders.
In September 2023, Suntory Holdings announced a collaboration with leading Asian energy company ENEOS to collect UCO in Japan.
Suntory Group said it was also looking into using the collaboration to make bio-based PET bottles using bio-naphtha domestically produced at ENEOS Corporation's SAF plant, which was due to become operational after 2027.
As part of the Suntory Group Plastic Policy established in 2019, the group said it aimed to use only recycled or bio-based material for all its PET bottles used globally by 2030 and eliminate the use of virgin petroleum-based materials.
To achieve this goal, the group has been working towards reducing the weight of PET bottles, caps and labels based on the group’s 2R+B (Reduce/Recycle + Bio) strategy for about 20 years.
The group has also been promoting “bottle-to-bottle” horizontal recycling in Japan through agreements with over 100 municipalities and more than 40 companies and has introduced recycled PET bottles in its products.
As of 2023, more than half of its soft drink bottles sold in Japan used 100% recycled PET bottles, the company said.
