A partnership between Coca-Cola and Japanese company Toyo Seikan has received an award for innovation in drink packaging.
The companies won the Research and Development Category prize at the Japan Packaging Technology Association's 49th Kinoshita Award, according to Toyo Seikan Group Holdings, Ltd., for their 185-gram Georgia-brand coffee product lightweight can.
The new packaging is the latest in a years-long campaign to reduce the weight of the drink giant's beverage containers.
Toyo Seikan's crucial role in this endeavor is its compression bottom reform technology, which increases bottom pressure resistance for aluminum cans. The development reduces material usage by 13%, as the can still maintains the necessary internal pressure resistance with thinner aluminum.
This development in brand packaging could have substantial implications for Coca-Cola, which is notoriously one of the world's worst plastic polluters.
Earlier this year, its CEO, James Quincey, announced that the brand could lean more into plastic packaging in response to the U.S.'s 25% tax on metal imports, if they make the cost of aluminum higher, according to the BBC.
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Turning to plastic instead of aluminum for cost reasons could have a major impact on our planet. Plastic waste takes hundreds of years to break down, and it pollutes our ocean with trillions of pieces of trash that harm and kill fish and even transport invasive species to far reaches of the planet.
By reducing the amount of aluminum needed to successfully can their beverages, Coca-Cola and Toyo Seikan's newest packaging offers an alternative path.
Aluminum cans are far more easily recycled than plastic bottles and amount to minimal waste in the process. Plus, the less material needed would likely lower costs in producing cans.
If scaled up to other markets beyond Japan, the brand may be able to lean away from plastic packaging, regardless of tariff concerns, in favor of a more recyclable alternative.
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