Ball Packaging Europe earned the accolade for its Ball Resealable End (BRE), in the 2008 Can of the Year Awards, organised by The Canmaker magazine.

The special cap prevents cans from leaking after they have been opened and preserves the drink’s carbon dioxide content.

The device, which took five years to develop, was launched on Coca-Cola’s energy drink Burn in France earlier this year.

The can is opened by rotating a high-density polyethylene cap anti-clockwise, and an inner polypropylene circular cap with a thermoplastic sealing ring moves away from the end and enables the drink to be consumed. Resealing is achieved by a screw mechanism within the inner part of the device.

The caps are manufactured on a double cube injection moulding and assembly system, which has 64 cavity tooling. Line speed is 384 ends per minute and estimated yearly capacity is about 150 million ends.

Ball Packaging worked with a number of technology partners on the project: Foboha (cube moulds), Ferromatik Milacron (injection moulding technology) and Hekuma (automation systems).

Dr Jörg Dassow, director of marketing at Ferromatik Milacron, said the resealable cans are suitable for cold filled products up to 6.2 bar internal pressure, and shelf life of the drink has been verified at six months.

He said the process cell is based on two injection moulding machines, the first being a cube mould machine with integrated pressure testing and the second a twin cube machine with in-mould assembly of the plastic parts and metal blank. Robots are used in the cell including the final assembly stage where a label giving user instructions is added.

Dassow, was speaking earlier this month at the Plastics Caps and Closures 2008 conference organised by European Plastics News. He used as the sources for his presentation information from Ferromatik, Ball Packaging and an article in The Canmaker.

John Nutting, Canmaker editorial director, said the industry had been “waiting for years” to see the commercial application of a resealable lid on a drinks can and described Ball Packaging Europe as a worthy winner.

He said: “Making a success of a product like this is a huge undertaking, requiring not just innovative design but the use of highly sophisticated manufacturing techniques requiring unprecedented quality control.

“It also must meet Coca-Cola’s stringent requirements that enable BRE to be used within its high-speed filling operations. For the beer and beverage world this is the equivalent of putting a man on the moon.”

The BRE design also won the gold accolade in the Two-Piece Beverage Cans category and silver in the Ends, Caps and Closures section of the awards.

The caps were invented by Antonio Perra, the director of Dutch firm Bound2B, and produced following close collaboration between Ball Packaging Europe and Coca-Cola.

They were launched in France earlier this year following market tests on other Coca-Cola drinks in Germany and the Channel Islands and are expected to be rolled out in North America soon.