PACKAGING BRIEFS Thursday, Feb. 3

Limited-edition Diet Coke can again promotes heart health
February is American Heart Month, and for the fourth consecutive year, Diet Coke is partnering with the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute to support The Heart Truth campaign. This year, Diet Coke has created a national game of "Capture the Flag," inviting people to visit DietCoke.com/HeartTruth where they can capture flags with a click of the mouse to trigger a donation from Diet Coke to heart health programs. Diet Coke is also bringing the "Capture the Flag" campaign to consumers in stores. For the second year in a row, Diet Coke has released limited-edition cans and bottles in recognition of American Heart Month. This year, the packages feature a stylized stick figure waving a heart flag in support of The Heart Truth. In addition to these limited-edition cans and bottles, more than six billion packages of Diet Coke will continue to carry The Heart Truth logo to raise awareness of women's heart health year-round.

Deadline nears for DuPont Awards
The deadline for entries in DuPont's 23rd Awards for Packaging Innovation is Feb. 28, 2011. The competition honors innovations in packaging materials, processes, technology, service achievements and sustainability. The entries will be reviewed by a panel of international judges: Pepsico China's food packaging associate director Geoff Giddens; Jim Hanna of Starbucks; Unilever UK's packaging capability director Louis Lindenberg; Alvaro Azanha, Sadia's packaging technology director; Dr. Martin Berlekamp, PET technology director at Klöckner Pentaplast; and Jane Bickerstaffe from the INCPEN in the UK.

BASF ramps up bioplastic production
BASF has started operations at its expanded plant for the production of the biodegradable plastic Ecoflex. Expansion of the existing plant in Ludwigshafen, Germany, will increase production capacity for Ecoflex from 14,000 to 74,000 metric tons per year. At the same time, BASF will ramp up compounding capacity for Ecovio, a derivative of Ecoflex. The company expects significant market growth for bioplastics through 2020.

Sonoco's crush tester becomes standard procedure for paperboard tubes/cores
Sonoco has reached an agreement with the Composite Can and Tube Institute (CCTI) to make its patented Radial Crush Tester for spiral-wound paperboard tubes and cores available to the industry. According to Kristine Garland, evp of the CCTI, the organization's Technical Committee will develop and publish a standardized industry-wide testing procedure for measuring radial crush with the Sonoco radial crush tester. The Radial Crush Tester will be demonstrated at CCTI's Spring Operations Meeting, Mar. 16-17, 2011, in Myrtle Beach, SC.

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