Lotte Hotels & Resorts to upcycle used PET bottles

South Korea's Lotte Hotels & Resorts said on Friday that it will collaborate with Lotte Chilsung Beverage and Lotte Chemical Corp. to establish a "Bottle to Bottle" resource recycling system.

Through this system, label-free water bottles collected from guestrooms at Lotte Hotel Seoul will be retrieved by Lotte Chilsung, the bottled water supplier, and then upcycled by Lotte Chemical into new PET bottles.

Since mid-July, Lotte Hotel Seoul has already encouraged guests to participate in recycling by providing separate guidance on label-free water bottles in the rooms. Since the trial implementation, Lotte Hotel Seoul has collected over 800 kg of used PET bottles.

Lotte Hotels & Resorts plans to gradually enhance the reduction of plastic waste by expanding this system and working with other group companies to reduce the weight of water bottles and improve collection rates.

"The recycling rate of domestic waste plastic is still below 30%," a Lotte Hotels & Resorts source said. "We aim to tribute to achieving a circular economy."

Write to Jae-Kwang Ahn at ahnjk@hankyung.com