Liberty Bottleworks, Union Gap

Green Enterprise & Technology

When REI, LL Bean, Willie Nelson and the Dave Matthews Band want an environmentally friendly, toxin-free aluminum bottle, they turn to the high-tech Liberty Bottleworks factory near Yakima. In just three years this company has churned out a half million bottles that are part fashion statement, part reusable container and all-American. The outsides are decorated with high-resolution textural art that you can feel as well as see. The insides are powder coated without use of phthalates or BPA in a closed-loop process, part of the company’s zero-waste philosophy. Water is retreated and reused on site. The infrared lamps that cure the powder are 800 percent more efficient than conventional curing ovens. Since Liberty’s are the only American-made metal bottles in the marketplace, they are the first housewares product that Whole Foods NW has been able to promote as “locally made.”