O-I has further boosted the environmental credentials of glass packaging by launching a new, lightweight, standard half-litre beer bottle. This move follows 'intense interest' from brewers in the bottle produced for Adnams beers- which won a Starpack award last year- and, more recently, in the new Marston's bottles in flint and amber. O-I's new 300g container, available to all UK brewers in clear and amber glass, uses the same blank moulds as the Adnams bottle. This has enabled O-I to reduce the weight of its standard half-litre bottle by around 33 per cent. Figures released by WRAP indicate that, if all 500ml ale bottles decreased weight at this rate, the reduction would save 10,055 tonnes of glass - with all the associated environmental savings in terms of carbon, energy consumption, quarrying and transportation.
