Drinks can celebrates diamond anniversary

After three quarters of a century on the market, the can lays claim to being world’s most recycled, sustainable and innovative drinks package.

Over the decades, through a series of technical innovations, this versatile and refreshing drinks container, first used to package beer in 1935, has become completely integrated into our modern lifestyles, accounting for more than 25% of all carbonated soft drinks and beer packaging in Europe.

Continual lightweighting of the beverage can means it’s now possible to produce three times as many cans from the same amount of virgin material as it was 30 years ago. Today, the 330ml tinplate can weighs just 21g – the aluminium can just 10g, with a wall thickness thinner than a human hair.

Some further reductions in the weight of the can are likely, but it’s now recognised that boosting recycling rates offers the potential for significant environmental benefits in terms of carbon emissions and resource conservation (it’s possible to recycle a can indefinitely without quality deterioration, with recycling saving up to 95% of energy needed to produce virgin material with a corresponding reduction in CO2 emissions). The European average for can recycling is 65% and has increased steadily. With a target to have three out of every four cans recycled in the future, the need for virgin material and energy will be further reduced. When recycling a can, 75–95% of the energy is saved.

Innovations such as digital printing, embossing, thermochromic inks, self-​cooling and resealable cans have also made the can one of the coolest, most convenient drinks packages on the market.

Can timeline – key dates in the history of the beverage can

• 1935 – the first canned beer is sold by US brewer Gottfried Krueger in Richmond, Virginia.
• 1953 – cans are used to package soft drinks for the first time.
• Early 1960s – introduction of two-​piece aluminium can, enabling faster production and use of less metal.
• 1975 – introduction of stay-​on tab, or ‘ecology end’, a key sustainability development.
• 1992 – introduction of the ‘widget’.
• 1995–2010 – introduction of innovations such as large opening end (or ‘gulper’), under-​tab printing, thermochromic and light-​sensitive inks, digital printing, embossing, self-​heating and self-​chilling cans and resealable cans.
• 2009 – 51bn beverage cans filled in Europe alone.

Source: BCME

About the author

Bill Bruce is group editorial director of FoodBev Media

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