Through close and enduring collaboration BillerudKorsnäs and Tetra Pak aim to push the figure of renewable material from wood fibre in carton packages towards 100%. Today the figure is about 70%. New innovations to further increase the sustainability of packages are since long top of the agenda for both companies.
‘Our mission is to challenge conventional packaging for a sustainable future. Seventy percent renewable is a good start, and the only way that we can solve the major sustainability challenges we face is to do it together,’ said Malin Ljung Eiborn, director sustainability and public affairs at BillerudKorsnäs.
The collaborative innovation takes the form of a number of defined projects where experts from the two companies work together. BillerudKorsnäs also works together under the auspices of Treesearch, a Swedish collaboration platform for fundamental research, knowledge and competence building in the field of new materials and specialty chemicals from forest raw material. It involves academia, industry, private foundations and the Swedish government, and aims to turn pioneering fundamental research into high tech innovations to meet the climate challenge.
‘Treesearch is important because we can get advanced research on new materials and new applications, but also because we have an opportunity to build competence, with skilled people coming into the industry who will be able to develop more innovative products in the future,’ said says Malin.
BillerudKorsnäs and Tetra Pak are long term partners in the quest to achieve package that is hundred percent from renewable resources.
‘We want a package that is hundred percent from renewable resources. We need a lot of innovation to find these new materials that can create a good barrier. We have to act together to transform the industry. And there are so many challenges, so much innovation to do,’ said Eva Gustavsson, vice president materials and package at Tetra Pak.