In this critical period of global consensus on sustainable development, the business community is exploring innovative paths to minimize the burden on the environment with unprecedented enthusiasm.
Tetra Pak, a leader in the packaging industry, has taken a landmark step forward by joining forces with Schoeller Allibert, one of the world's leading experts in recyclable transportation packaging solutions.
As the world accelerates towards carbon neutrality, the sustainable transformation of packaging and logistics is at the heart of the solution. 31 March 2025, the innovative partnership between Tetra Pak and Schoeller Allibert has opened a new chapter in the transformation of traditional transport packaging into a circular economy, with the recycling of aluminum-plastic materials from used beverage paper packaging as a breakthrough. A new chapter in the transformation of traditional transportation packaging into a circular economy.
Core Technology: 50% Recycled Aluminum-Plastic Materials to Build High Performance Recycling Carriers
The Materials Revolution: Reconstructing the Value of Waste
As a technology leader in the field of recyclable transport packaging, Schuler Allerab has made a breakthrough by combining 50% aluminum composite recycled material from used beverage paper packaging with recycled resources from other sources (100% virgin-free) to develop warehouse crates and reusable logistics packaging that meets stringent industry standards.These products not only pass mechanical tests (load bearing, impact resistance, weathering), but also realize an environmental advantage that is difficult to achieve with traditional plastic packaging - a single crate is made from approximately 200 recycled beverage paper packages, reducing virgin plastic consumption at the source.
Application on the ground: green upgrading of the supply chain
The first samples are currently undergoing field durability testing at Tetra Pak's Global Spare Parts Distribution Center in Lund, Sweden. If verified, Tetra Pak will gradually replace more than 50,000 traditional crates. This move is expected to reduce the use of thousands of tons of virgin plastics every year, embedding a “green gene” in its global supply chain. This is not only an internal carbon reduction practice, but also sets an industry benchmark for sustainable logistics equipment.
Cooperation model: open synergy to accelerate the commercialization of technologies
From single project to ecological co-construction
This collaboration is not an isolated innovation, but a platform for sharing technology for the circular economy. While serving Tetra Pak, Schuler Alibaba is taking an open stance to interface with customers in multiple sectors such as food, retail, and manufacturing to provide customized recyclable transport packaging solutions based on this innovative material. This “technology development - scene verification - scale replication” model breaks down industry barriers and promotes innovations from the lab to the global market.
Demonstrating the value of cross-industry synergies
By integrating Tetra Pak's packaging recycling network and Schuler Alibert's material processing technology, the two parties have built a complete closed loop of “packaging production - use - recycling - reclamation”. This model proves that cross-industry synergy not only enhances resource utilization efficiency, but also gives rise to new business forms, providing a replicable path for the global manufacturing industry to solve the problem of “balancing sustainable development and cost-effectiveness”.
Industry Insight: The Deeper Logic from Materials Innovation to Systems Change
Executive Perspective: The Two-Wheel Drive for Sustainability
Schuler Alibaba Britta Wyss Bissang"
Customer demand for supply chain ESG has gone from ‘optional’ to ‘essential’, and material innovation is the key to solving the paradox of sustainability versus performance. By upgrading our recycling technology to turn aluminum-plastic waste into durable, industrial-grade materials, we're not just iterating on a product, we're proving that waste is a resource."
Tetra Pak Kinga Sieradzon"
The mission of aseptic paper packaging is not only to ensure food safety, but also to recycle materials at the end of their life cycle. This partnership has turned polyAl recycled materials from a ‘potential possibility’ into a ‘commercial reality’. In the future, we will join hands with our global recycling partners to develop more ‘second-life’ products such as crates and outdoor furniture. In the future, we will work with our global recycling partners to develop more ‘second-life’ products such as crates and outdoor furniture, and build an infinite recycling system for packaging materials."
Marie Sandin, Tetra Pak Sweden"
The Lund plant is proof that sustainable materials can be integrated into the office, production and logistics. When each crate carries not only goods, but also the recycled value of 200 used packages, it's a tangible expression of the circular economy - environmental protection and efficiency can go hand-in-hand."
The technical underpinnings: scientific deconstruction of the closed loop of packaging recycling
The multi-layer structure of “70% FSC™ certified paperboard + ultra-thin aluminum layer + polymer layer” of aseptic beverage paper packaging creates natural conditions for recycling
Fiber layer: extracted and recycled into paper products by paper mills, realizing the recycling of wood resources.
Aluminum-plastic layer: Through physical sorting and melt recycling, it is transformed into high-strength granules, which can be used to manufacture logistics equipment, outdoor facilities, etc., to build a closed-loop of “Packaging→Industrial Products→Secondary Recycling”.
This process not only solves the pain point of traditional packaging that “single material is easy to recycle and composite material is difficult to handle”, but also opens up a new track of cross-industry material regeneration.
Industry Impact: New Definition of Green Competitiveness in Transportation Packaging
Implications for Industry
Technical level: to prove the feasibility of high-value recycling of composite packaging materials, and to promote the industry to shift from “single-material dependence” to “full-constituent recycling”;
Commercial level: to verify the cost competitiveness of sustainable products, and to break the inherent cognition that “environmental protection requires high price”; Ecological level: to build a synergistic ecology of “packaging enterprise + logistics equipment + recycling network”, and to accelerate the construction of circular economy infrastructure. Commercial level: to verify the cost competitiveness of sustainable products and break the inherent cognition that “environmental protection must be expensive”;
Ecological level: to build a synergistic ecosystem of “packaging enterprises + logistics equipment + recycling network”, and to accelerate the construction of recycling economy infrastructure.
Demonstration value for the world
In the context of the EU Packaging and Packaging Waste Regulation (PPWR) about to be fully implemented and the construction of China's “Waste-Free Cities” deeply promoted, the case provides a “technology + mode” double-driven solution for countries to solve the problem of packaging waste. When the transportation box is no longer a “disposable consumable” but a “recyclable resource carrier”, what is mapped behind it is the deep transformation of the whole industrial system to “reduce, reuse and resource”. Deep transformation of the whole industrial system to “reduce, reuse and resource utilization”.
The cooperation between Tetra Pak and Schuler Alibert is much more than the creation of a new transport box. It is a reversal of the “linear economy” - giving aluminum-plastic materials, once considered waste, a second life in logistics equipment; and a reinterpretation of “sustainable development” - proving that environmental goals and business values can coexist through technological innovation. It is also a re-interpretation of “sustainable development” - proving that environmental goals and business values can be realized through technological innovation and symbiosis.
When more and more enterprises realize that circular economy is not a cost burden but a core component of future competitiveness, this innovative practice, which started in Lausanne, Switzerland, will eventually become an important footnote in the green transformation of the global industrial system. In the countdown to carbon neutrality, such “green synergy” is a key step towards a sustainable future for mankind.
