Amcor launches first commercial container utilizing LiquiForm technology
Ann Arbor, Mich.-based Amcor launched its LiquiForm technology, which it says can reduce supply chain costs and has the potential to improve packaging consistency and lower the carbon footprint associated with filling and packaging. Amcor develops and produces packaging for a variety of food, beverage, pharmaceutical, medical-device, home- and personal-care and other products.
Amcor partnered with Greenblendz, a Michigan-based co-packer and developer of private brands and environmentally friendly consumer products, to develop and commercialize packaging for Ahold Delhaize’s Nature’s Promise brand of hand soap. Amcor produced the 12-ounce polyethylene terephthalate (PET) bottle on a proprietary Amcor-built machine powered by the LiquiForm process. The new machine is the industry’s first manufacturing unit to successfully utilize the LiquiForm technology.
“We’re excited to be a partner in the commercial validation of such a highly sustainable manufacturing process,” said Steve Berry, founder and COO of Greenblendz, in a press release. “LiquiForm technology delivers enormous efficiencies throughout the supply chain and improves the industry’s carbon footprint.”
LiquiForm technology uses the packaged product instead of compressed air to simultaneously form and fill containers. In this case, the hand soap essentially forms its own rigid PET container using the LiquiForm process. By combining the forming and filling into one step, the process eliminates costs associated with the equipment and energy of the traditional blow molding process along with the handling, transport and warehousing of empty containers, according to Amcor.
“LiquiForm has the potential to revolutionize the filling and packaging industries with a more flexible, efficient and sustainable supply chain,” said Ann O’Hara, vice president and general manager of Amcor Rigid Plastics’ Diversified Products Division. “The development and launch of the first commercial manufacturing machine and the introduction of the first commercial product represents two major milestones for the LiquiForm technology.”
The forming of bottles with Amcor’s LiquiForm process also opens new pathways toward lighter, more sustainable packaging, according to the company. Lighter-weight containers, achieved through improved consistency in wall thickness, combined with a reduction in the transport of empty containers, reduces environmental emissions and lowers the carbon footprint. The LiquiForm process also offers the potential to reconfigure supply chains and move packaging closer to the market, resulting in strong logistical benefits and further carbon footprint reductions, according to Amcor.
The bottle, which contains 50 percent post-consumer recycled (PCR) content, is a drop-in replacement for the current Nature’s Promise container and uses the existing closure and label.