Rieke, a subsidiary company packaging group TriMas, has announced the commercialisation of a new dispenser pump that, from the start, has been designed with recyclability in mind. The patented MonoTM-2e pump, which, after a year of testing for production and commercial robustness, is in production today. Targeted at consumer packaged goods (CPG) applications, the recycle-ready dispenser is a significant breakthrough in the packaging for the beauty and personal care industry.
Conventional pumps are composed of a mix of materials such as metal springs, polypropylene, polyethylene and others. This combination of different material types made recycling a challenge. The metal spring, for example, could contaminate the plastic recycling stream if it somehow got mixed in, which mean that consumers must discard the closure prior to recycling. The six parts of the patented mono-material pump are all made from a single type of polymer, which eliminates the problem and ensures it is 100% recyclable.
“Our goal was to deliver a pump, not only made with the same polymer, but also with the same polymer grade to simplify the streamflow of recycling in the coming circular economy,” said Howard Manning, Vice President and General Manager, Rieke Closures.
The dispenser is already being used by a global CPG company as an integral part of the packaging for one of their major new brands.
The dispenser was a 2020 finalist in the Sustainability Packaging Coalition Innovator Awards. Its quality and performance were lauded, as was the fact that the use of a single polymer contributed to the higher quality of the recyclate derived from these dispenser pumps - and hence also to a higher quality of potential applications.
“This is an innovative model to shift the waste value chain where the product is not only designed to perform during the consumer’s use, but also optimises the regrinding offering to the next PCR user providing the best stability in terms of viscosity and process. As a result, we have generated a high-value flow stream in a circular economy,” said Fabio Salik, President of TriMas Packaging.