Food or Food Packaging?

I’ve picked a loaded topic for the day and the outcome may surprise you, I have to say even I was a bit surprised at the facts out there on this one!

We’re tackling “bioplastics” also known as “compostable” or “biodegradable” plastics.  Surprisingly, bio-plastic is created by combining bacteria with sugars from corn, sugarcane or grains.  They essentially eat away at the plastic until it is hard and able to be melted into different molds for packaging, cups, baby bibs, trash bags, even a cell phone casings! Bio-plastics are recognizable by their # inside the recycle symbol on the bottom with PLA (polylactic acid), PA 11 or PHB instead of PETE.

While labels tout that they are “compostable”, I wondered about what conditions it would take to break this material down to truly biodegrade.  Being that my family composts I conducted an experiment several years ago with a local grocery store brand of “corn- based” cups.  I ended up taking the cup out of the composter 4 months in and it was still almost in tact.  It turns out that most manufacturers of bio- plastics admit that their products will break down best in a commercial composting facility where temperatures are extremely high to break down organic matter.  Most municipalities in the US do not have industrial composting facilities.

In addition:

• The production of bio- plastic still requires fossil fuel- although less than conventional plastic.
• Growing crops for bio-plastic takes up land on the limited 11% of earth’s land space that is used for food production for packaging- this shift could further    jeopardize world hunger.
• Bioplastics are hard to recognize and when thrown in with regular recycling pose a huge problem for plastic recycling facility’s machinery.

There are some redeeming qualities and great uses for bio-plastics such as for leaf collection, composting pail liners, and trash bags. The other bonus: bioplastics don’t contain fossil fuels, and considering 1.5 million barrels of oil are used yearly to produce American’s single use water bottle consumption, that’s something to consider! 

At the end of the day, like everything else it’s a Catch-22 for the environment and only you can make the choice.  Bio-plastics are promising, but haven't reached their full potential.   So, our recommendation is as sustainable as it comes- avoid single use containers all together.

Tags: biodegradable_plastic, bioplastic, recycling