German beverage company Rheinisch-Bergischer Mineralbrunnen-Vetrieb GmbH & Co. KG and its sister company, Christinen of Bielefeld, Germany, produces still and carbonated mineral water “from one of the deepest sources in the world” as well as 12 varieties of juice drinks and sodas. Its products are distributed throughout the North-Rhine Westphalia region of Germany in channels that include food retailers, hotels, restaurants, cafes, and office and workplace environments.
A primary focus of the mineral water company is environmental responsibility. In 2014, Christinen received Germany’s Bio-Mineralwasser organic seal of quality and is an active participant in the Alliance for the Protection of Water, a group that lobbies for the end of fracking. Clearly, sustainable operations are important to the organization.
The company’s packaging facility in Bielefeld operates three filling lines, each with a capacity of approximately 30,000 bottles/hr. In 2013, the company updated an existing blow-molding machine with a newer model on one of its lines in order to achieve higher speeds, reduced energy consumption, faster changeover, and the flexibility to lightweight its bottles in the future.
The new machine is an SBO16 Universal 2 Eco blow molder from Sidel, which features energy-saving oven lamps. “Environmental consciousness and sustainability are key values for us,” says Rheinisch-Bergischer Director and owner Dr. Paul Gehring. “The Universal Eco has enabled us to reduce our energy usage.”
New oven design
The SBO16 Universal 2 Eco installed at the Christinen facility has 16 blow-molding stations and is capable of producing up to 35,200 bottles/hr of the company’s range of 0.5-L PET formats. In the future, the machine will blow-mold 1-, 1.5-, and 2-L PET bottles as well.
Explains Dr. Gehring, the key features making the machine most suitable for Christinen’s needs are “the Ecoven and the unmatched big process window.”
Added to the SBO Universal 2 range in 2010, the Eco model with Ecoven is said to decrease oven power consumption by more than 45%. This energy savings is made possible through changes in the oven configuration that help lower installed electrical power up to 40% and heating time by up to 15%. The Eco model uses fewer oven modules and fewer lamps per module (eight instead of nine). This also results in a smaller oven footprint. According to Sidel, the greater precision of preform heat treatment ensures that the bottles display the same technical characteristics and quality offered by those produced using its traditional SBO Universal range.
Multiple improvements
According to Dr. Gehring, the improvements achieved with the new blow molder versus the former machine include labor savings, greater productivity, efficiency and quality, and lower costs. “Regarding labor, our operator is now able to follow a second blow molder,” he relates. “Our productivity has improved greatly because of the higher output of the machine, and implementation of the latest technology has greatly improved our efficiency. In addition, there are now fewer repair costs as well as fewer variable costs.”
