Regional overview: Asia

Over the past decade, a number of Asian container glass producers have opted for lightweight glass bottles. Glass International presents an overview of lightweight glass production in three major Asian glass markets.

Asia opts for lighter glass

Lightweight glass bottles have become extremely popular in the global container glass industry over the last two decades; a number of glass producers have added lightweight bottles to their portfolio in recent years.

Rapid advances in manufacturing technology has made it possible to create particularly thin-walled lightweight glass containers. Instead of the traditional blow-and-blow process, glass producers have chosen the narrow-neck-press and blow process.

Lightweight glass technology enables glass manufacturers to produce bottles to weigh much less while remaining as strong and stable as their heavier predecessors.

In 2019, the average weight of bottles had fallen by 30% over the previous decade, according to figures from Statista. For example, Accolade, the biggest wine bottler in the UK, has decreased its proportion of bottles over 500g from 17% in 2017 to 3% in 2020. Over the same period, the amount of bottles that weigh less than 390g has risen from 24% to 42%.

Recently, global brewer AB InBev developed the world’s lightest longneck beer bottle for commercial production. Frederik De Graaf, Global Director of Packaging Technology Development at AB InBev said: “If used on a year’s worth of glass production for AB InBev brands in Europe alone, this would be the equivalent to taking 62,000 cars off the roads annually, in terms of CO2 emissions.”

The brewer has reduced the weight of its standard longneck beer bottle from 180 to 150 grams, reportedly cutting its CO2 emissions by 17% per bottle.

“This success is the fruit of intensive collaboration with our external glass partners, having shared knowledge and worked together on new glass coatings, new mould coatings and modern converting technology to strengthen the glass.”

Mr De Graaf went on to highlight the difficulties within the project.

“When reducing the weight of the bottle, we were faced with strength challenges – beer is, of course, a carbonated drink and inside pressure can build up due to the gas expanding under certain heat conditions.”

AB InBev is now exploring how to release the new bottle, initially in Europe, as a one-way deposit. The next challenge for the company and its glass suppliers will be to further develop technologies to lightweight returnable bottles, which need to survive many cycles.

Asian production

Much like their European counterparts, Asian producers have embraced lightweight container glass production technology .

Although the volume of lightweight glass containers produced in Asia is far less (as a % of total production) than Europe, it is growing each year.

Along with the savings in raw material, energy and total cost of production, lightweight containers are also gaining in popularity due to rising transportation costs. The growth in e-commerce, and demand for cost-efficiency in relation to fuel, will create more opportunities in the near future in Asian countries.

Japan

Japanese container glass producers have been the pioneers of lightweight glass production in Asia.

Major manufacturers Toyo Glass and Nihon Yamamura Glass Company have provided technical assistance to a number of glass producers, as well as producing their own lightweight bottles.

They have assisted the Philippines’s San Miguel Yamamura Glass (SMYPC), South Korean Kumbi Glass Corporation and Technopak Solutions, Indonesian PT Muliaglass, Vietnam’s San Miguel Yamamura Haiphong Glass and Thailand’s Siam Glass.

The Japan Glass Bottle Association determines the lightweight level of all glass containers using a specific

Class Degree of Light weighting ( L Value)

Level I Level II Level III

1.4 < L 1.0 < L< 1.4 0.7 < L < 1.0 Level IV L < 0.7 L value is calculated by the following formula, L Value = 0.44 × Mass (g) ÷ Brimful Capacity (ml) 0.77. project

� Table1

mathematical formula. The containers are then divided into four classes from Level I to Level IV, with IV being the ‘ultra lighweight bottle’ category. (Table 1)

According to the Nihon Yamamura Glass website:

“Lighter weight bottles help conserve resources during production, conserve energy during production and transport, and reduce CO2 emissions.

“In addition to bottles for general use, we also develop ultra-lightweight bottles for specific customer products.”

Japan’s Kirin Brewery reduced the weight of its reusable beer glass bottles in recent years with the assistance from the country’s container glass producers and Japan’s Institute of Packaging Innovation. Kirin Brewery opted for innovations such as ceramic coating, that forms a thin film on the outside surface of glass bottles, an impact resistant shape design and a bottle mouth design. The bottle mouth is easy to open, can be tightly sealed and is chip resistant, achieving Japan’s lightest returnable glass beer bottles in all three sizes: large, medium and small.

India

12,000 tonnes per day, India is the second largest container glass producing country in Asia. Container glass producers in the country, Hindusthan National Glass and Industries (HNGL), AGI glaspac and PGP Glass (formerly Piramal Glass) have invested in the technology for the production of lightweight glass containers.

AGI glaspac’s President & CEO, Rajesh Khosla told Glass International:

“AGI glaspac produces beer containers in amber, green and flint colours throughout the year in NNPB (Narrow Neck Press and Blow) & BB (Blow and Blow) technologies for almost all the major customers in India and some European customers.

“Glass is the preferred packaging material for beer due to its superior UV absorption properties. We can nurture a basic idea or concept through a stepby-step product development process to realise the final packaging product using our professional design capabilities.

“Our focus is not only on quality but also on introducing new products to the market quickly. We now have a comprehensive bottle design service, a glass analytical laboratory and a training school.

“The technology for production of glass containers by NNPB method i.e. press-and-blow developing of lightweight narrow-necked glass container products, has been implemented in our both plants, which have a capacity of 1600 tonnes/day.

“For each sector like pharma, liquor, beer and food, we have light-weighted bottles constituting 10 to 14% of our production.” The market size of the Asia-Pacific container glass market is forecast to reach US$ 61.0 billion by 2026, at a CAGR of 4.3% between 2021-2026.

He added that lightweight glass has been a gamechanger, which offers the same resistance as older glass materials and higher stability, reducing the volume of raw materials used and CO2 emitted.

It has led to increased demand for glass containers due to its various benefits, such as being infinitely reusable, recyclable and refillable. It has led to the increased adoption of lightweight glass, which is a vital factor contributing to its market growth.

Countries such as India, South Korea, China and Thailand have observed a substantial increase in beer consumption.

Mr Khosla added: “In striving to make lighter weight glass containers available, technologies dictate the final limit of what can be achieved.

“By implementing developing technologies in forming and related areas, significant advancement in weight reduction may be realised.

“On the other hand, the increase in beer consumption has also positively impacted the Asia-Pacific container glass market as most beer is packaged in glass bottles.

“The wide availability of other alternative packaging materials is estimated to create challenges for the growth of the Asia-Pacific container glass market.”

India’s largest producer of wine, Sula Vineyards, has opted for lightweight glass bottles for packaging of its wine products. Company Executive Rajeev Samant, said: “In FY’21 we have completely moved away from importing glass bottles for packaging, by developing a domestic vendor for manufacturing bottles. Our bottles were previously imported from France and Dubai, whereas now they are supplied from AGI glaspac in Hyderabad,

India. This has led to massive savings in freight carbon emissions in our supply chain. We sourced about 3,000 MT of glass for packaging domestically in FY’21.

“We have worked with our vendors to develop lightweight bottles. Manufacturing of lightweight glass bottles requires less amount of heat during the melting process, the bottles are more convenient to transport and can be cooled using less energy.”

ASEAN

The region has seen a number of container glass producers emerging from small-scale to mid and large-scale manufacturers in the past two decades. Thailand’s Bangkok Glass Industry, Thai Glass Industry, Siam Glass, Indonesian PT Mulia Glass and the Philippines’s SMYPC have emerged as some of the most important players in the region. All of these producers have adopted to the production of lightweight glass bottles in varying degrees in the past decade.

An executive from Siam Glass told Glass International in a communication on the condition of anonymity:

“There is no doubt that lightweight glass bottles enables container glass producers to save raw material and energy costs by a considerable degree.

But, there has been some hesitancy among the end-user segments. In particular, some producers in the alcoholic beverage sub-segment are still reluctant in using lightweight glass bottles for their products.

Their most cited concern is about how their products may be perceived if they opt for lightweight glass. As consumers often associate the weight of the bottle with the quality and luxury of the product and, by extension, the brand. An example of this is how more expensive, luxury wine brands often have heavier bottles in comparison to cheaper wine products.”

Siam Glass Industry operates a total of six glass melting furnaces at three production facilities in Thailand at Rojana, Samut Prakarn and Ayutthaya. These production facilities are equipped with NNPB production to produce lightweight glass containers for energy drinks and beverage industries. � https://www.yamamura.co.jp/english/ https://www.agi-glaspac.com https://www.osotspa.com/new/en/osotspagroup/index.php

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