Verallia, a manufacturer of glass packaging for beverages and food products, has announced an agreement to acquire Santaolalla Group’s cullet treatment centres.
The deal involves the acquisition of a total of five glass waste processing facilities, for both industrial flat glass and hollow glass.
The acquisition of these cullet (recycled glass) treatment centres is in line with Verallia’s sustainability goals and commitment to increase the use of cullet in its packaging.
As part of the transaction, Verallia has agreed to acquire three companies under Santaolalla, comprising Ecosan Ambiental, Ecolabora, and Vidrologic.
The acquisition of Ecosan Ambiental will add four cullet treatment centres to Verallia’s portfolio. These centres are located at Quer in Guadalajara, Santander’s Torrelavega, and two in Burgos, all located in Spain.
Verallia is purchasing the fifth plant, a flat glass treatment centre in Anadia, Portugal, from Vidrologic.
Finally, the acquisition of Ecolabora will allow Verallia to take a major role in the logistics of collecting glass for recycling.
Verallia Group CEO Patrice Lucas said: “As a leader of our industry, we must be the ones to drive transformation, going further and faster by promoting a circular economy.
“This acquisition and the investment we are doing all over Europe to increase our cullet capacity treatment is fully aligned with our ESG [environmental, social, and governance] roadmap.”
The latest deal will further allow Verallia to progress towards achieving its carbon dioxide (CO₂) reduction target to achieve a 46% reduction in emissions by 2030 compared to 2019.
The five new cullet plants from Santaolalla will be added to Verallia’s existing four factories in the Iberian Peninsula, a mountainous region occupied by both Spain and Portugal.
Out of these four existing plants, two were commissioned by Verallia earlier this year.
Verallia Iberia general manager Paulo Pinto added: “At Verallia, we try to ensure that our activity contributes positively to the objective of our strategy, ‘Re-imagine glass for a sustainable future’, with a commitment to significantly reducing our CO₂ emissions in all our operations and improving the circularity of glass packaging.”
