The company said that its MuCell technology for extrusion blow moulding represents a breakthrough in bottle technology, using gas-injection to create gas bubbles in the middle layer of the bottle wall. This reduces the density of the bottle and the amount of plastic required.
According to Unilever, 33m Dove Body Wash bottles were sold in Europe last year. The new technology is set to save 274 tonnes of plastic a year. A full roll-out on every Unilever product and packaging format could save around 27,000 tonnes of plastic per year.
Unilever collaborated with two of its global packaging suppliers, ALPLA and MuCell Extrusion. Unilever will waive specific exclusivity rights by January 2015.
Paul Howells, Vice President R&D Packaging at Unilever said: "We're always on the search for new technologies that can help us achieve our ambition to build a more sustainable business and halve our environmental footprint, and working with our two partners, we've created a unique technology that will transform our portfolio. But there's only so much that Unilever can achieve on our own; and by opening up access to other manufacturers we will really start to see an impact. We very much hope that our peers in the industry will take advantage of this technology too and apply it to their products."
