We have been producing bottles for the sports industry for over 30 years and we continue to take steps to do this as sustainably as possible. This starts with the raw material, for which we always choose for biobased plastic, made from sugar cane. We also ensure that the bottle has the best quality, making sure it lasts extra long. But eventually there comes a time when a bottle is completely used, we lose it or they are thrown aside during a sporting event. And what happens after that?

In August 2022, together with CIRCULR., SAARand Milieu Service Nederland, we wondered whether we could make the sports industry more circular. Together we decided to start a pilot with the aim of demonstrating that it should be at least possible to save discarded sports equipment, including sports bottles, from residual waste and to prevent these valuable raw materials from being lost. Food safety legislation currently prevents you from making a new water bottle from an old one. But we are going to prove that the circular sports bottle is the future by actually starting to produce them.

Collecting the sports bottles

Together with CIRCULR., SAAR. and Milieu Service Nederland, we have spent 2 months looking for used sports bottles. Through sports clubs, social media campaigns and our own network, we have collected nearly 3,000 used bottles. This number had to be achieved in order to get enough material for a serious test.

One of the parties that has enthusiastically taken up our collection action is Samen Circulair. They have encouraged local football teams to help with the collecting sports bottle. At the beginning of 2023, they personally handed over the bottles to Eurobottle. Samen Circulair collected, together with the girls’ football team, the most bottles. Because of this they won 200 recycled sport cones, provided by CIRCULR.. Watch the full video

Shredding the collected products

All collected water bottles have been brought together in our warehouse. We have first removed all the caps from the bottles and after that sorted the products by type of plastic. To guarantee the best possible quality, it is important to accurately separate the types of materials. But from experience, we know that 100% perfect sorting is not possible. To take this into account, we deliberately included a few bottles with cap and a different material type in the shredding process, to see which effect this cause.

We wanted to do as extreme a test as possible, so we decided to only empty the used bottles and not rinse them. Normally sports bottles are printed with the logo of a brand or sponsor. This ink is not easily removable from the bottle and so the bottles have been put into the grinder with the print still on. The result is a colorful mix of plastic.

This yielded a total of almost 200 kg of recycled material.

Reuse of the plastic

After shredding the plastic, it’s time to see if we can actually reuse it to make a new bottle. The ground material is relatively fine, so it can be processed directly in the machine.

The result? The bottles look great! Except for a few. We immediately see the effect of foreign plastics in the bottle. The foreign materials cause holes in the bottle. You don’t want that to happen! Fortunately, most bottles are good, it works!

From bottle to bottle…

The production of bottles from recycled raw material is, as already mentioned above, unfortunately not yet allowed if it is intended for use with food. This is only set aside for single-use PET bottles from the well-known deposit system. Our sports bottles are made from LDPE, which gives them their fine, familiar, and high-quality properties.

However, we would like to show these water bottles to demonstrate that it is technically very possible to make a good water bottle from an old one. To clearly show the current limitation, we have printed them with a clear message: Don’t use me – Show me. This implies that these bottles are only to be used as display models and not for drinking. The pilot was successful! We managed to make a functionally good bottle from old ones. This is a good base to start a conversation with the regulators, because we see the future in recycling bottles!

But how to proceed?

We are going to repeat this pilot on a larger scale. With the results, we will have external laboratories demonstrate that the products are safe to use. We will challenge the regulators to engage in conversation with us. There is legislation in the making that will prescribe that recycled materials must be used. These regulators will then also have to facilitate that this material can actually be used. We are going to give them a helping hand!

Until that time, we will intensify the collaboration with CIRCULR. and SAAR, to guarantee that used water bottles do not end up in the residual waste. CIRCULR. and SAAR transform recycled water bottles into, for example, high-quality sports accessories and medals. This extends the lifespan of the material and prevents waste. In this way, we give our bottles a second life and reduce the impact on the environment.