Verallia has celebrated the reconstruction of one of its two furnaces at its Lagnieu, France site. The company invested €24million to rebuild the furnace and modernise the production lines, which specialises in the manufacture of glass food containers.

The new glass furnace, which produces about 2 million jars per day, has been completely rebuilt and the five production lines it supplies have been modernised.  The reconstruction provided an opportunity to use the latest technologies and more modern materials, in particular to improve the energy performance and environmental impact of the facilities, in line with the group's environmental commitments.

For example, this new furnace has a new combustion control system that promotes its homogeneity and therefore reduces hot spots, which emit nitrogen oxides. This modernization also improves the reliability of the installations, the quality of the production and contributes to improving the working conditions of employees.

The work also provided an opportunity to deploy an ambitious training program of more than 1,000 hours, organized around the use of modernized machines, occupational safety, production quality and industrial excellence, one of Verallia's priorities. Olivier Rousseau, General Manager of Verallia France, gathered customers at the Lagnieu plant to celebrate the reconstruction.At the inauguration, Michel Giannuzzi, Chairman and CEO of Verallia, said: "This modernisation illustrates our sustained investment policy, which allows us to maintain the operational excellence of our production facilities.

"This project is fully in line with our objective to establish ourselves as the preferred supplier of glass packaging.”