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Coca-Cola's 25% Reusability Promise by 2030

Aggiornamento: 19 ago 2024

Small Premise: This is a SCQA (Situation, Complication, Question, Answer) type article that aims to demystify a claim made by Coca-Cola in 2022 regarding a promise they made for their PET and glass bottle packaging to be 25% reusable by 2030 worldwide.

I started from the conclusion and went backwards to outline the contextual and analystical evidence that made me reach that conclusion.

I am looking forward to reading your opinion on it and eventually starting a collective debate! Feel free to either leave a comment below or text me on LinkedIn/email :)


Conclusion:

Transparency is absent in Coca-Cola's disclosures surrounding the following Claim: “Coca-Cola will sell at least 25% of all beverages globally across its portfolio in refillable or returnable glass or plastic bottles, or refillable containers through traditional fountain or Coca-Cola Freestyle dispensers by 2030”.[1] The vagueness of the claim is embedded in a current context in which Coca-Cola continues to boost its dominance in being a top global single-use plastic polluter (see graphs 1&2). Moreover, by employing vague language and omitting key information in building its sustainable promises and claims, the company obscures its actual practices while perpetuating an illusion of environmental responsibility. The latter can only be thoroughly assessed through deep analysis that leads to numeric values. In this case, if the claim gets maintained, there would be some carbon footprint saved (2.24 billion CO2e grams per year) but it still would consist of only a small fraction (13%) of Coca-Cola’s packaging-related yearly carbon emissions (16.7 billion CO2e grams per year). From this, concrete and measurable goals and a commitment to transparently addressing the environmental impact throughout the entire supply and value chain are imperative for Coca-Cola both for reaching carbon neutrality by 2040 and for gaining credibility regarding sustainability claims.


Vague Claim:

For starters, is the claim fully unambiguous, transparent, and self-explanatory? Neither the claim itself nor any Coca-Cola document defines any criteria for what constitutes "refillable" and "returnable", including, for instance, how many times PET and glass bottles can be reusable (reusability rate). The rate for the latter is 50 times higher than for PET bottles according to PwC.[2] This implies that Coca-Cola should focus its efforts on producing a higher rate of reusable glass bottles compared to PET. However, there is no information on how the 25% would be allocated between PET and glass bottles.

 

Coca-Cola as a Top Plastic Polluter:

Compounding these transparency and reusability concerns is Coca-Cola's constant current ranking as one of the world's top single-use plastic polluters. This information is not mentioned at all in Coca-Cola’s sustainability reports.




As Graph 1 shows, Coca-Cola has the highest number of plastic pieces (almost 20 thousand single-use plastic bottles found in liveable habitats) that were dispersed and found across most countries (39).[3]


Graph 2 worsens the situation by showing that the number of plastic pieces recorded by global brand audits increased throughout 4 years (2019-2022)[4]. The percentage increase from 2020 to 2021 was the greatest (43%), despite their announced efforts to reduce pollution associated with single-use plastic bottles.[5]


Actual bottles-related GHG emissions saved if the promise gets respected are still too low and the values are based on too many assumptions:

The actual grams of CO2 saved would be 2.34 billion per year (see calculations 1,2,3 in the appendix). This is approximately 13% of the total Coca-Cola annual GHG emissions (that are 16.7billion grams of CO2 per year - see calculation 4 in the appendix). This is obviously not enough considering Coca-Cola’s goal to be GHG-neutral by 2040.[6] 

The appendix consists of 16 assumptions throughout the 4 pillar calculations. These assumptions are made for the sake of a linear comparison but, above all, to compensate for the lack of information from Coca-Cola’s documents and disclosures.


Omission of Environmental Impact Beyond Bottles:

While having many benefits (eg: customization), Coca-Cola's Freestyle dispensers significantly contribute to increasing the company's direct GHG emissions.[7] 



According to Graph 3, out of the 2019 Coca-Cola’s total value chain’s carbon emissions, 30 to 35% comes from cold drinks equipment, including fountain dispensers. Coca-Cola didn’t disclose any information on the amount of GHG emissions associated with the new prototypes and how these would affect the 30-35%.



Figure 2: New Coca-Cola Freestyle Countertop Dispenser (source: https://www.coca-colacompany.com/media-center/freestyle-unveils-countertop-fountain-dispenser)


Research Question:

Is Coca-Cola's examined claim conductive towards carbon neutrality, or does it represent a form of greenwashing?


Answer:

After demystifying Coca-Cola’s claim, we can conclude that the claim is purely made of greenwashing. The lack of specific key terms in defining the claim, the company currently increasing its dominance as a top single-use plastic polluter, the small percentage of saved carbon footprint, and the omission of the environmental impact of the fountain dispensers are all proofs of greenwashing.

 


Appendix: Calculations for Bottles-related Carbon Footprint and Value Chain’s total GHG Emissions

Calculation 1: carbon footprint saved from producing 25% less single use glass and PET bottles

Assumption 1: Coca-Cola produced approximately 163 billion single-use bottles in 2021, of which 134 billion are PET bottles (82%) and 29 billion glass bottles (18%).[8] It is assumed that the production levels of 2030 and the following years are the same as the 2022 ones.

Assumption 2: the 2030 production ratios of glass and PET will be the same as in 2022.

Assumption 3: Since we don’t know the ratio of 1.5L bottles/total bottles, we’ll just assume Coca-Cola just produces 1.5L bottles for the following calculation.

Assumption 4: carbon footprint values are associated with 1.5L glass and PET bottles.

Assumption 5: to make a comparative analysis involving solely glass and PET, the emissions associated with aluminum cans are not included

Assumption 6: to make a comparative analysis involving solely glass and PET, the carbon footprint of other parts of the bottles (eg: the Coca-Cola paper label) is not included

Assumption 7: Each 1.5L single-use PET bottle generates approximately 162 grams of CO2 equivalent in its life-cycle.[9]

Each 1.5L single-use glass bottle generates approximately 550 grams of CO2 in its life-cycle.[10] 

Assumption 8: Coca-Cola plastic bottles are all PET bottles due to the lack of information on the percentage of plastic and PET bottles.

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  • Methodology: The carbon footprint saved from producing 25% less single-use glass and PET bottles is the difference between 100% and 75% of the total impact, with the latter being ((PET bottles production level x impact per single-use PET bottle in CO2e grams) + (glass bottles production level x impact per single-use glass bottle in CO2e grams))

  • Results: carbon footprint saved from producing 25% less single-use glass and PET bottles: ((134 billion PET bottles 162 grams of CO2e/1.5L bottle ) + (29 billion glass bottles 550 grams CO2e/1.5L bottle))1 - ((134 billion PET bottles 162 grams of CO2e/1.5L bottle ) + (29 billion glass bottles 550 grams CO2e/1.5L bottle))0.75 = 5825750000000 CO2e grams saved each year


Calculation 2: carbon footprint associated with producing 25% of refillable glass and PET bottles

Assumption 1: Since we don’t know the ratio 1.5L bottles/total bottles, we’ll just assume Coca-Cola just produces 1.5L bottles for the following calculation.

Assumption 2: The ratio for the production of glass and PET refillable bottles is the same as the ratio of single-use glass and PET bottles.

Assumption 3: Coca Cola plastic bottles are all PET bottles due to the lack of information on the percentage of plastic and PET bottles.

Assumption 4: Each 1.5L refillable PET bottle generates approximately 103 grams of CO2e in its life-cycle.[11]

Each 1.5L refillable PET bottle generates approximately 127 grams of CO2e in its life-cycle.[12]

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  • Methodology: The carbon footprint associated with producing 25% of refillable glass and PET bottles is 25% (0.25) times the total impact, with the latter being (PET bottles production level x impact per refillable PET bottle in CO2e grams) + (glass bottles production level x impact per refillable glass bottle in CO2e grams)

  • Results: carbon footprint associated with producing 25% of refillable glass and PET bottles: ((134 billion PET bottles 103 grams of CO2e/1.5L bottle) + (29 billion glass bottles 127 grams CO2e/1.5L bottle))*0.25 = 3542575000000 CO2e grams used each year


Calculation 3: actual carbon footprint saved

  • Methodology: The actual carbon footprint saved is the difference between the carbon footprint saved from producing 25% less single-use glass and PET bottles and the carbon footprint associated with producing 25% of refillable glass and PET bottles

  • Results: actual carbon footprint saved = calculation 1 – calculation 2 = 2.24 billionCO2e grams saved per year


Calculation 4: Coca-Cola’s total GHG emissions

Assumption 1: Co2e grams corresponds to GHGe grams

Assumption 2: manufacturing accounts for the 10% of the total carbon emissions across their value chain.

Assumption 3: According to Coca-Cola’s 2022 sustainability report, packaging accounts for circa the 30% of Coca-Cola’s total CO2 emissions (carbon footprint)

According to Graph 3, manufacturing accounts for 10% of the total shares of carbon across their value chain. According to Statista, the total GHG grams just for manufacturing is 5.56 billion grams of GHG (which is equivalent to 5.56 million metric tons of GHG).[13] 

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  • Methodology & Results: Settling up the following simple proportion gives us the total GHG grams annually produced by Coca-Cola in its value chain: 10 : 5.56 billion grams = 100 : x. x = 55.6 billion grams of GHGe (CO2e) across its value chain. The 30% of this 55.6 billion grams is 16.7 billion grams

 


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