The challenge
To make glass, sand must be heated to above 1,500°C. Such high temperatures require a lot of energy, so we looked for ways to reduce our energy consumption for more responsible production.
What we did
One way we reduced the energy required to make glass is by adding recycled glass, also called “cullet”, to the mix.
Another way we reduced our energy footprint is by using less glass. This wasn’t an easy process because we still needed the packaging to maintain the same strength and resistance to breakage on its journey from the glass manufacturer to your cupboard.
The results
We are proud to say our jar redesign has been a success. In Japan alone, we were able to save a total of 7,672 tonnes of glass over four years thanks to improvements in three different NESCAFÉ jar designs. Not only did we save glass, we reduced our footprint by 6,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide (the equivalent of what would be produced by 1,300 cars in a year), 200,000 m3 of water (enough to supply 3000 people for a year), 252 tonnes of plastic and 20,000 gigajoules of energy.
