Penrith leads the way in glass manufacturing

This month’s Penrith Made feature is focused on one of the world’s most sustainable packaging materials – glass. You’ll learn about a local company with a long history of making bottles and jars and discover local businesses who fill them with their wares.

Did you know Penrith is home to the largest glass manufacturing plant in Australia?

That’s right, O-I Glass Penrith produces a staggering 4 million bottles and jars a day from its 11 hectare facility in Andrews Road.

Originally opened as Glass Containers in 1971, the business changed hands several times before becoming part of the Owens-Illinois (O-I) Inc group.

O-I itself is the world’s largest glass container manufacturer, employing more than 27,000 people at 77 plants in 23 countries. In 2018 the company achieved $6.9 billion in net sales.

In Australia, the company employs around 1,100 people across 5 plants, including 250 people in Penrith.

O-I Penrith produce beer, wine, spirit and soft drink bottles and food jars.

Plant Manager Emmanuel Villalobos describes the Andews Road facility as “pivotal to our Australian manufacturing network” – including major customers Tooheys, CUB, Diageo and Bundaberg Brewed Drinks.

“Penrith is in a great location to supply many of our customers, particulary those based in Sydney and even Victoria,” Mr Villalobos said. “And we’ve always enjoyed the support of the Penrith community. We have a history of attracting good local employees and we support local shools through apprenticeships and with other career opportunities.”

“At O-I Penrith we’re proud to be continuing to build manufacturing in Australia and to provide local products, jobs and business for our suppliers and vendors.”

And, says Mr Villalobos, mass produced doesn’t mean artistry or sustainability go out the window.

“We are always striving to make innovative containers that differentiate our customers from their market,” he said “We offer one of the most sustainable packaging options in the world and this has huge environmental benefits. In addition, we give our customers access to a local supply of glass containers, which means they don’t need to import products and they’re supporting local manufacturing.”

Every tonne of recycled glass can be turned into one tonne of new glass packaging – which makes glass 100% recyclable.

O-I sources glass from Visy Recyling – the facility that sorts the items Penrith residents put in their yellow lidded bins – as well as from other local suppliers.

“It’s all local. We call it a closed loop system – where our bottles can be used, recycled and back on the shelves within 30 days,” Mr Villalobos said.

By using recycled glass, or cullet, as a raw material in their glass container manufacturing O-I are:

• reducing virgin raw material usage (soda ash, sand and limestone) that would otherwise be extracted
• producing energy savings of around 3% for every 10% of cullet used, as it requires less energy to melt than raw materials, and
• reducing carbon emissions of around 5% for every 10% of cullet used in production.

“We always challenge ourselves to reduce our carbon footprint further,” Mr Villalobos said. “This includes light-weighting our products and using more recycled content to make containers.”

It also includes O-I’s partnership with Cadence Property Group who will build a 50,000sqm warehouse next to the existing O-I manufacturing facility allowing the company to reduce its transfer costs and carbon emissions.

Learn more about the expansion in our previous story.