Written question asked by Mark Tami (Labour) on Friday, 2 June 2006, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Tuesday, 6 June 2006. It was answered by Ian Pearson (Labour) on Wednesday, 21 June 2006 on behalf of the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.

Bottle Production

Question: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what estimate he has made of how much energy is used to produce (a) plastic and (b) glass water bottles.

Answer: Neither Defra nor the Carbon Trust holds this information. Defra collects data on energy use by the food industry. However it is not possible to break down the data to the level needed to estimate the energy used to produce plastic or glass bottles for packaging spring or mineral waters. Energy use in producing bottles is, in any case, only one factor that needs to be taken into account—along with others such as transport, and re-use or re-cycling of materials—when assessing which type of packaging is the best sustainable option.

Secondary information