Sonoco expands ability to recycle EnviroCan containers

Sonoco, a global provider of packaging products based in Hartsville, South Carolina, plans to expand its postconsumer recovery and recycling opportunities for its EnviroCan paper containers. In June, the company announced the ability to use the EnviroCan paper containers as a raw material at three of its paperboard mills.

According to a news release from Sonoco, the company is expanding the ability to use the EnviroCan paper containers at 10 of its paperboard mills to produce new paperboard.

Elizabeth Rhue, staff vice president of sustainability at Sonoco, says all of Sonoco’s U.S. paper mills have validated that they can accept rigid paper cans in bales of mixed paper coming from residential material recovery facilities (MRFs). These mills will use the mixed paper to produce 100 percent recycled paperboard with up to 85 percent postconsumer fiber. Ten of the company’s paper mills will accept EnviroCan paper containers, including its mills in Menasha, Wisconsin; Newport, Tennessee; City of Industry, California; Hartsville, South Carolina; Holyoke, Massachusetts; Richmond, Virginia; Summer, Washington; Hutchinson, Kansas; DePere, Wisconsin; and Wisconsin Rapids, Wisconsin.

“Sonoco is uniquely positioned as a leading recycler, paper mill operator and paper packaging converter to help grow end of life solutions across not only our consumer and industrial packaging platforms but across the paper industry,” Rhue says. “After validating that our mills could recycle EnviroCan factory scrap, we are now taking the lead to further demonstrate the ability to recycle our paper containers with metal ends not only through the steel stream, as it is largely done today, but also through the postconsumer mixed paper stream.”

Tim Davis, division vice president and general manager of Sonoco’s U.S. and Canada paper operations, says this collaboration across the company’s manufacturing network highlights the flexibility the company has to recycle and process fiber-based packaging through its conventional paper mill pulping systems.

Rhue adds, “This is one of many steps Sonoco is taking to further our commitment to responsible material sourcing at our manufacturing operations, while building material circularity into our consumer packaging platforms. If a consumer recycles an EnviroCan paper container and it is sorted into the mixed paper stream, the cans can now be sent to our mills to be turned into a number of new fiber products, including new EnviroCan containers.”