With the demand for energy and natural feedstock usage continually increasing in the world, there is a growing need for sustainable products made from renewable materials. Global packaging enterprise Elopak has taken on the ambitious goal of achieving a net zero impact on the environment, as featured in “Stories of Possible”, a campaign that captures the way Sabic is helping to realise customers’ ambitions. The stories reveal how Sabic helps to make possible their customers’ visions to better serve the industries in which they operate and create their competitive advantage for the long term. This film shows how the collaboration with Sabic has taken Elopak further in their ambition to achieve absolute sustainability.

Elopak is an international supplier of packaging solutions for liquid food. The company produces 13 billion cartons a year - sold in more than 100 markets worldwide - as well as carton-filling machines, secondary packaging solutions for the distribution of filled cartons. In addition, the company supports the packaging design process through co-developments with customers and web-based services.

Elopak has a vision to achieve absolute sustainability by 2020. To achieve this ambitious objective, the company aims to reach 100% use of renewable materials and energy sources, 100% carbon neutral products and operations, 100% recyclable finished cartons and raw materials and 100% use of materials for production, so nothing goes to landfill.

In 2014, Elopak became the first company in the liquid packaging industry to introduce a carton made of 100% renewable materials. FSC certified paperboard - a long-standing and recognized solution - makes up 75% of the end product. However, for the other 25%, the company needed to find a truly sustainable coating.

It was at this point that Elopak decided to work with Sabic. Sabic offers a portfolio of both renewable polyethylene and polypropylenes, certified under the ISCC Plus certification scheme, an independent system for the chemical industry to prove sustainability of bio-based products.

According to Niels Petter Wright, CEO of Elopak, “We have today the world’s lowest CO2 footprint packaging system. The certified renewable polyethylene that SABIC can supply us is helping us to further deepen that product and system footprint.” The certified renewable Sabic LDPE nExCoat5 is produced by Sabic's proprietary high pressure Clean Tubular Reactor (CTR®) technology with additional proprietary patented technology, which results in a resin which outperforms traditional autoclave grades. This material solution is capable of replacing grades with melt indices ranging from 4 to 8, helping Elopak reduce inventory costs and simplify production processes. In addition, Sabic LDPE nExCoat 5 has a 15-20% lower carbon footprint when compared to standard market grades.