Coca-Cola Andina and Coca-Cola Embonor, the bottling arms of Coca-Cola in Chile, plan to recycle 350 million bottles a year into 100% recycled PET resin in a new facility called Re-Ciclar.

Matías Mackenna, general manager of Re-Ciclar, told Just Drinks the $35m investment was made in partnership by the two companies, which have set up an 8,000 sq m facility in the Lampa commune, in the metropolitan area of Santiago de Chile.

“Coca-Cola Andina and Coca-Cola Embonor are partners in their participation and operation”, Mackenna said. “At the operational level, the daily management of the plant is in the hands of an executive team hired directly by Re-Ciclar and led by a general manager. This structure allows an efficient distribution of tasks and responsibilities, ensuring the correct functioning of the plant.”

The new facility will produce drinks packaging containing recycled food-grade material for the first time for Coca-Cola in Chile.

Starting in 2025, all beverage bottles in the company's local portfolio will contain 15% recycled PET resin, a percentage that will gradually increase to 100% recycled containers.

Re-Ciclar is the third recycling plant in Latin America operated by Coca-Cola, along with others in Mexico and Paraguay.

Paola Calorio, sustainability director for Coca-Cola Chile, said in Paraguay the company has a circular PET plant, operated by Coca-Cola Paresa (a representative of Coca-Cola Andina in the country, along with INPET and CORESA) but Re-Ciclar is their most modern bottle recycling operation in the region.

“In addition, in different parts of the continent, we already use containers with recycled material in different percentages, even in some countries such as Bolivia and Argentina, which already have bottles with 100% recycled PET”, she said.

The goal for 2024 is to collect at least nearly 10,000 of PET to be recycled. For this, the companies have forged alliances with the National Association of Recyclers of Chile, Latitud R, The Possible City and other local organisations that are the base of the recycling chain.

The base recyclers and managers are responsible for collecting, stockpiling and delivering the PET plastic to Re-Ciclar. Upon arrival, the bottles go through a cleaning, analysis and crushing process, transforming the packaging into flakes which go through an extrusion, crystallisation and post-condensation process that allows them to recover the physical and chemical properties of PET in order to become recycled resin pellets.