Consumer goods group Henkel (Düsseldorf / Germany; www.henkel.com) is expanding the content of regranulated resin in the flexible packaging of laundry detergents from 10% to 50%. The company aims to achieve this together with partner Mondi (Johannesburg / South Africa; www.mondigroup.com). It provided no details on time frame, but said the effort is part of its "Factor 3" programme to cut down ecological footprint of its products.

Henkel sell its "Megaperls" washing power in so-called "Quadro seal bags" made of OPP/PE laminate. At present, 30% of the package’s PE layer consists of industrial waste reclaimed from Mondi’s factory in Halle / Germany. That means the overall package structure contains approximately 10% regrind material.

The resin reclamation technology at Mondi’s Halle plant allows the firm to collect and separate not only transparent and white materials, but also those that do not contain a slip agent. This helps enable the use of regrind material in the laminate without compromising its specifications and the product’s mechanical properties.

The packaging is easier to recycle as the OPP/PE laminate structure consists entirely of polyolefin materials.

According to Henkel, with Mondi it looks forward to significantly boosting the percentage of reclaimed content in more Henkel packaging.

Last March, Henkel collaborated with Waste Free Oceans (WFO, Brussels / Belgium; www.wastefreeoceans.org), and announced it will produce more than 1m bottles for the company's "Lovables" laundry brand by using plastics waste recovered from oceans, rivers, lakes, seas and oceans – see Plasteurope.com of 11.04.2018.