Lego is abandoning its plan to make building blocks from recycled PET bottles. After several years of testing, the toy company from Billund, Denmark, has decided not to continue with this project. A spokesperson for the Lego Group announced this on Monday in Scandinavia.
Most plastics are based on crude oil, including the material used in Lego bricks. According to the spokesperson, the company is not giving up its efforts to find oil-free materials for its products: Lego remains committed to producing building blocks from sustainable materials by 2032.
In June 2021, Lego presented the prototype of a building block made from PET plastic from discarded bottles, meeting the company’s quality and safety requirements. This prototype now remains in the drawer. According to Lego, additional steps in the production process ensure that the material does not reduce the CO2 emissions of the building blocks.
Production with recycled PET is even more energy intensive
When the material of recycled PET bottles was tested, it turned out that it actually caused an increase in CO2emissions during production would result. “It is softer than ABS and therefore requires additional additives. The processing would be very energy intensive,” explains Tim Brooks, head of sustainability at Lego.
Recycled PET is just one of hundreds of different sustainable materials Lego has tested, Billund said. The group is currently testing and developing a number of alternative materials, including other recyclable plastics and materials from other sources such as e-methanol.
According to the company, Lego wants to invest more than 1.2 billion dollars (about 1.1 billion euros) in sustainability initiatives by 2025.
Source: Krone
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