Austria’s Greiner Packaging International (Kremsmünster; www.greiner-gpi.com) is banning the use of bisphenol A (BPA) in its production of food packaging. All lines will be BPA-free by the end of March 2014. The company said the move mainly concerns 5-gallon water bottles that were still being made from PC.

CEO Willi Eibner explained, “In the last few years, we have gained a lot of knowledge in the sector of processing BPA-free raw materials. Our customers now benefit further from this advanced knowledge.” Greiner said it had excluded BPA from the production of baby bottles in 2009, two years before the EU ban; its "Kavodrink" bottles have also been manufactured from BPA-free raw materials for over two years. Currently, "Tritan" copolyester from US producer Eastman Chemical (Kingsport, Tennessee; www.eastman.com) is the Austrian company's preferred BPA-free raw material. It has been approved by the FDA in the US and the EU's EFSA. For the production of its 5-gallon water bottles, Greiner Packaging uses it in injection stretch blow moulding and extrusion blow moulding.

An increasing number of countries are implementing bans on BPA: France is prohibiting BPA in all food packaging from 2015 – see Plasteurope.com of 05.09.2013 – Belgium and Sweden, which has also announced plans for a wide-ranging ban – see Plasteurope.com of 21.11.2012.