Ball

Metal Packaging

Ball is a global leader in metal packaging for beverage, food and aerosol products. We look at metal packaging with passion and purpose. The unique sustainability profile of metal packaging is one of its many advantages when compared with other packaging materials.
  • Cans can be recycled infinitely with no loss of quality
  • Cans are the most recycled food and beverage containers in the world
  • Cans have the highest scrap value, subsidizing the collection and recycling of other materials
  • Cans are recycled through a well-established and efficient infrastructure
  • Cans can be recycled and returned to a store shelf as a new can in just 60 days
  • Cans are stackable and have a high cubic efficiency, making them cost-effective to transport
  • Cans are lightweight, unbreakable and provide superior product protection
  • Cans chill faster
Beverage Cans

Beverage Cans

Learn why the aluminum beverage can is today's package of choice.

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Aerosol Cans

Aerosol Cans

Ball aerosol cans are efficient, easy-to-use, versatile and sustainable.

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Responsible Sourcing

Responsible Sourcing

Building a sustainable supply chain through collaborative relationships with our suppliers.

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METAL PACKAGING IN A CIRCULAR ECONOMY

Metal cans are produced using abundant and recycled materials. The earth’s crust consists of approximately 8% aluminum. With that, it is the third most common element. Steel is made from iron-ore, limestone and coking coal, three very common natural resources. Iron is the fourth most plentiful element.

Both, steel packaging via magnets and aluminum cans via eddy current technology, can be separated easily from other substrates in the waste stream. Approximately 70% of all aluminum cans and 68% of all steel packaging are recycled globally, making the can the world’s most recycled packaging product.

Because metals are 100% and infinitely recyclable, they can be reused in various applications to become new products again and again. Metal recycling has been around as long as metals have existed. In fact, nearly 75% of all aluminum and 80% to 90% of all steel ever produced is still in use today. Thanks to the well-established recycling infrastructure, a recycled aluminum package can be back on the store shelf in as little as 60 days.

To understand metal packaging’s environmental performance and its role in a circular economy, the entire life cycle of the product must be considered. That is why Ball has been involved in life cycle assessments since the mid-1980s.

Life Cycle

Understanding the life cycle of our products.

Recycling

Metals are completely and infinitely recyclable.
Customer Perspective
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"We are in the business of selling beverages in single-use packaging, and our team shares a passionate commitment to finding ways to neutralize our impact on the environment. Consumers are starting to recognize the negative impact of single-use plastic water bottles, yet their choices in grocery and convenience stores are limited. As an agile, independent company, we know AMI is uniquely positioned to help address this need, and we are so proud to provide an environmentally-friendly water brand, celebrating the infinite recyclability of aluminum, in the hands of our consumers."
 
- Michael Kirban, CEO of All Market Inc. (Vita Coco, RUNA, and Ever & Ever)

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Dedicated to Innovation

In every step—from concept, design, manufacturing and filling to delivery of the final product to the consumer—innovation helps us identify and drive profitable growth. We work closely with our customers to understand their businesses and consumer demand, as well as the challenges and trends they encounter so we can develop industry-leading packaging solutions and graphics to help them grow their businesses.

Often invisible to the outside world, many of Ball’s successful product and process innovations—such as weight optimization of our cans or increasing manufacturing speeds—provide significant environmental and economic benefits to the company, our customers and consumers. We evaluate innovations through a variety of lenses, including consumer benefits, carbon footprints, costs and the impact of new products on the recycling process.

Our intent is to make the lightest metal containers possible while meeting the performance requirements of our customers. Even small weight optimizations save significant amounts of metal, costs, energy and emissions when multiplied by the billions of containers that Ball produces each year (click here for an example). That is why weight optimization represents a major contribution to our 2020 beverage can carbon footprint reduction target.
BPANi Coatings

CONFIDENCE IN COATINGS

We work proactively with our suppliers to develop coatings that are effective and meet expectations for transparency and safety.

These coatings have for many years included trace amounts of bisphenol A (BPA). Acting in response to stakeholder feedback, we have developed with our suppliers a new generation of coatings that contain no intentionally added BPA. In partnership with our customers we have already converted a significant portion of our business to these new coatings and we expect that this transition will speed up as more and more customers select this option.

As part of our broader vision to create more transparency and confidence in the aluminum beverage can, we have gone further and are seeking Cradle to Cradle™ material health certification for coatings we use, as well as other materials such as sealants and varnishes. Cradle to Cradle™ material health certification requires product ingredients to be inventoried throughout the supply chain and evaluated for their impact on human and environmental health.

Once assessed by a third party, a product can be assigned a Material Health Certificate at an achievement level of basic, bronze, silver, gold or platinum, upon meeting certain requirements. To date, more than one-third of our European coatings, sealants, and varnishes have received a material health certification. These certificates provide a foundation for confidence in formulations and suggest roadmaps for improvement so that we can continue to offer our customers a variety of coating solutions.

Net Positive

Packaging is only a small fraction of the overall waste generated in the household, commercial and industrial sectors. However, it is very visible and, in a world of scarce resources, attracts attention from consumers, the media and nongovernmental organizations.

Packaging is a part of a multifaceted solution to the issues of food loss and waste in the supply chain. Packaging plays a critical role in delivering products to consumers safely, conveniently and in perfect condition. Packaging protects and preserves food, beverages and other products as they move through supply chains. Well-designed packaging meets the product’s requirements while minimizing the economic and environmental impacts of the product and its package.

Metal packaging, in particular, prevents physical damage, protects the contents from the effects of oxygen and contaminants and maintains the nutritional value while providing convenience, portion control, space for consumer messaging and more efficient logistics.

Collaboration is Key

Ball’s technology team is working with suppliers and research organizations to identify innovative new technologies, equipment, materials and processes that will simplify manufacturing, eliminate barriers when broadening our geographic reach, and contribute to our sustainability goals and those of our customers.

To further enhance and promote metal packaging’s sustainability credentials, Ball collaborates with many industry partners in various ways. In addition to our memberships in various organizations that advance the sustainability credentials of packaging, we participated – for example – in the development of the "Global Protocol on Packaging Sustainability 2.0" (GPPS), published by the Consumer Goods Forum. The GPPS ensures a common language and metrics that enable informed discussions about packaging and sustainability.
 

Contact Ball

For more information

T: +1 303 460 4429
E: sustainability@ball.com