Sustainable packaging made with Bio-PE from used cooking oil

SABIC has joined forces with Lamb Weston, a global brand owner and producer of frozen potato products, in a closed-loop process designed to create low-weight sustainable packaging bags made with a thin coextrusion film structure. At least 60% of the packaging is made with polymer using bio- feedstock from used cooking oil (UCO).

The process starts with collection of UCO from Lamb Weston’s production which is then converted to bio- feedstock to produce certified bio-renewable SABIC® HDPE (high-density polyethylene) and SUPEER™ mLLDPE (metallocene linear low-density polyethylene) polymers. Final packaging contains at least 60% UCO-based bio-renewable polymer material as part of SABIC’s TRUCIRCLE™ portfolio. Oerlemans Plastics member of OPACKGROUP, a specialized manufacturer of flexible films and packaging, converts these polymers to a multilayer PE film for Lamb Weston pre-fried frozen potato products.

The new Lamb Weston retail packaging has an overall renewable feedstock content of at least 60%, which is certified from the polymers to the film. This is in line with the widely acknowledged International Sustainability & Carbon Certification (ISCC) PLUS mass balancing regime for tracking and tracing the renewable content in materials.

The combination of 20% reduced film thickness - the resulting bags have an average unit weight of only 10 g - and the use of bio-renewable SABIC® PE enables approximately 30% lower carbon footprint than the previous bags for this application. The SABIC® HDPE resin in the film structure delivers high strength and flexibility, while the SUPEER mLLDPE resin lends excellent bag sealing. Both materials comply with the requirements of the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) and the U.S. Federal Drug & Food Administration (FDA) for food-contact.

Following extensive testing and evaluation, the first frozen potato products packed in bags made with Oerlemans’s multi-layer film using certified renewable PE polymers from SABIC have been launched by Lamb Weston in September in the UK and the Netherlands.