Coca-Cola Investing in Startup to Boost Use of Recycled Materials

Coca-Cola Europacific Partners, Coca-Cola’s biggest European bottler, is funding a startup in the Netherlands which will produce food-grade recycled plastics from other plastics that typically are sent to landfills or incinerators. Those plastics include films, trays, clothing, and colored packaging.

“This new technology is critical to improve access to recycled material for bottles,” said Wouter Vermeulen, Coca-Cola’s senior director of sustainability and public policy in Europe. “The Coca-Cola system is committed to reducing our dependency on oil for producing virgin packaging materials and promoting recycling.”

The soda pop powerhouse, Coca-Cola, plans to have recycled materials make up 50% of its packaging by 2030. Currently, the soft-drinks group has achieved roughly 25%.

CuRe Technology, the startup Coca-Cola Europacific Partners will be funding, cleans and partially breaks down plastics to be reassembled into recycled material.

A study commissioned by CuRe shows that the process results in about 65% lower greenhouse-gas emissions than oil-based plastic production. This will be the second time Coca-Cola Europacific Partners has invested in CuRe since 2020.

“We are currently focused on scaling CuRe’s technology in the right way for use in Europe as a first priority, before looking at how this could benefit other markets,” Vermeulen said.

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