Are compostables really a greener solution?

As com­mu­ni­ties and enter­pris­es around the world con­sid­er how to pack­age prod­ucts sus­tain­ably, the recy­clables ver­sus com­posta­bles debate has gath­ered con­sid­er­able atten­tion. Tra­di­tion­al­ly viewed as com­peti­tors, these solu­tions to our addic­tion to plas­tics are actu­al­ly run­ning in dif­fer­ent races.

While a com­mon mis­con­cep­tion of com­postable pack­ag­ing is that it is biodegrad­able in nat­ur­al con­di­tions, the major­i­ty of these solu­tions must be bro­ken down under par­tic­u­lar indus­tri­al con­di­tions, which means dreams of waste in the envi­ron­ment break­ing down like organ­ic mate­r­i­al are far from real­i­ty.

Instead, the two sus­tain­able pack­ag­ing solu­tions have con­sid­er­able poten­tial as part­ners in the fight against envi­ron­men­tal pol­lu­tion, although their inter­ac­tion at a domes­tic lev­el pos­es chal­lenges.

Understanding compostable products

The Great Pacif­ic Garbage Patch is a dire, but effec­tive, rep­re­sen­ta­tion of where our dis­card­ed plas­tics can end up. The hulk­ing flotil­la of man-made detri­tus is a damn­ing indict­ment of the mod­ern world’s dis­re­gard for the envi­ron­ment, as well as a sober­ing exam­ple of the lev­els of waste that have entered ecosys­tems world­wide.

It is tempt­ing to hear of com­postable pack­ag­ing and hope that, in future, such mate­ri­als will sim­ply rot away rather than linger for cen­turies in the nat­ur­al world.

Sad­ly, this is not the case, with pack­ag­ing leader Amcor stat­ing emphat­i­cal­ly: “Com­postable or biodegrad­able pack­ag­ing is absolute­ly not a solu­tion to lit­ter and marine pol­lu­tion; if these mate­ri­als end up in nature, they often do not degrade and cause the same prob­lems as con­ven­tion­al plas­tics.”

Most com­postable or biodegrad­able pack­ag­ing, such as that derived from poly­lac­tic acid, requires par­tic­u­lar indus­tri­al tech­niques to decom­pose effec­tive­ly. Not only that, but com­posta­bles can often leave tox­ic residue behind, as well as releas­ing green­house gas­es into the atmos­phere as they degrade.

Com­postable or biodegrad­able pack­ag­ing is absolute­ly not a solu­tion to lit­ter and marine pol­lu­tion

Such mate­ri­als are effec­tive as part of the infra­struc­ture of a col­lec­tion and pro­cess­ing sys­tem. Work­ing along­side tra­di­tion­al recy­cling meth­ods, com­postable pack­ag­ing can facil­i­tate the decom­po­si­tion of food waste and tack­le the chal­lenge of food-tar­nished mate­ri­als being large­ly unre­cy­clable.

In oth­er words, to strive to be vic­to­ri­ous in the com­posta­bles ver­sus recy­clables debate is to miss the point as togeth­er they can increase the rate at which pack­ag­ing solu­tions are cir­cu­larised.

Rather than accept that the major­i­ty of food sachets or cof­fee pods can­not be dealt with in an envi­ron­men­tal­ly friend­ly way, sim­ply because food residue impacts the recy­cling process, lever­ag­ing com­posta­bles for these prod­ucts would mean they too can be processed with­out enter­ing the envi­ron­ment.

Integrating compostables into domestic life

Infra­struc­ture is cru­cial to enabling the effec­tive roll­out of domes­tic, com­postable pack­ag­ing solu­tions. Such mate­ri­als can­not be processed with tra­di­tion­al recy­clables and deposit­ing com­posta­bles in recy­cling bins only exac­er­bates the long­stand­ing issue of inap­pro­pri­ate mate­ri­als enter­ing recy­cling sys­tems.

“There is a dis­tinct pos­si­bil­i­ty that com­postable mate­ri­als could con­t­a­m­i­nate oth­er recy­cling streams,” says Gladys Nay­lor, group head of sus­tain­able devel­op­ment at Mon­di. “We need to find a way to over­come this chal­lenge by either improv­ing the waste stream sort­ing tech­nol­o­gy to col­lect com­postable pack­ag­ing in the same stream and avoid con­t­a­m­i­na­tion of oth­er waste for recy­cla­bil­i­ty, or design mate­ri­als that can be com­post­ed, but do not con­t­a­m­i­nate the recy­cling stream.”

So the con­tention of com­posta­bles ver­sus recy­clables takes on greater mean­ing as they can­not coex­ist with­in exist­ing recy­cling sys­tems.

Adding anoth­er ele­ment to domes­tic waste man­age­ment process­es tends to con­fuse an already poor­ly under­stood sys­tem. The State of Plas­tic Recy­cling 2020 report from mul­ti­pack­ing sys­tems sup­pli­er Hi-Cone found as many as 66 per cent of adults in the UK are unsure of how to recy­cle cer­tain plas­tics. Edu­ca­tion is of para­mount impor­tance as, with­out a pop­u­lace that under­stands the neces­si­ty of effec­tive domes­tic waste man­age­ment, or indeed the mech­a­nisms behind it, installed infra­struc­ture will nev­er be as effec­tive as it ought to be.

In short, com­posta­bles pro­vide some solu­tions to the chal­lenges faced by recy­clables, but they are not a panacea for waste pol­lu­tion. “Elim­i­nat­ing plas­tic pack­ag­ing would elim­i­nate the ben­e­fits it has over alter­na­tive mate­ri­als when con­sid­er­ing their envi­ron­men­tal impact dur­ing mate­r­i­al extrac­tion, pro­duc­tion and use,” says Jen­nifer Perr, sus­tain­abil­i­ty direc­tor at Hi-Cone.

“Build­ing a cir­cu­lar econ­o­my for plas­tics, ensur­ing plas­tic pack­ag­ing nev­er becomes waste and edu­cat­ing the pub­lic on the true cost of con­sump­tion of dif­fer­ent mate­ri­als, would be a major step in the right direc­tion.”

The challenges of recyclable materials

Frus­tra­tion for envi­ron­men­tal groups and com­pa­nies endeav­our­ing to deliv­er recy­clable pack­ag­ing, is root­ed in the infra­struc­tur­al chal­lenges and lim­it­ed aware­ness sur­round­ing recy­cling prac­tice. Plas­tics are com­plex and the infra­struc­ture required for com­pre­hen­sive recy­cling is a chal­lenge to deliv­er for all con­sumers, par­tic­u­lar­ly while those same con­sumers are often con­fused about what can be recy­cled and where.

Aside from devis­ing pack­ag­ing solu­tions that use less mate­r­i­al, recy­clable solu­tions are wide­ly con­sid­ered the most impact­ful means of curb­ing plas­tic waste enter­ing the envi­ron­ment. A fact of the com­posta­bles ver­sus recy­clables debate is that plas­tics, in par­tic­u­lar, are a prob­lem we can­not do with­out.

While biodegrad­able solu­tions can replace some plas­tic pack­ag­ing, any­thing requir­ing struc­tur­al sound­ness, pro­tec­tion from mois­ture, or rig­or­ous iso­la­tion from oth­er prod­ucts or atmos­pher­ic changes is still best placed in recy­clable plas­tic pack­ag­ing. Food­stuffs and med­i­cines are par­tic­u­lar exam­ples where plas­tics are nec­es­sary, with plas­tic food pack­ag­ing often being respon­si­ble for issues in the recy­cling process.

Achieving circularity with sustainable packaging

Ini­tia­tives led by the likes of the Ellen MacArthur Foun­da­tion (EMF) have been dri­ving the cir­cu­lar econ­o­my: a mod­el propos­ing that all prod­ucts in the val­ue cycle are not only reusable or recy­clable, but the required infra­struc­ture becomes a core focus for gov­ern­ment spend­ing and enter­prise strate­gies.

The ben­e­fits of a cir­cu­lar econ­o­my speak for them­selves; if we can use exist­ing plas­tics as mate­r­i­al for all new plas­tics, we can min­imise the amount of new mate­ri­als that must be processed, the ener­gy required, the car­bon diox­ide emis­sions released and the glob­al vol­ume of plas­tics pro­duced.

Of course, recy­cling is a noto­ri­ous­ly chal­leng­ing endeav­our. Not all plas­tics can be recy­cled and those plas­tics are so wide­spread with­in the pack­ag­ing indus­try that their uni­lat­er­al phas­ing-out would take some time. The infra­struc­ture for recy­cling, includ­ing col­lec­tions from homes and pub­lic spaces, is also not yet uni­ver­sal­ly avail­able. It is no won­der that glob­al esti­mates from the EMF place recy­cling rates at just 14 per cent as recent­ly as 2016.

Although there has been some move­ment towards real­is­ing the ambi­tions of a cir­cu­lar econ­o­my, the fact remains that the vast major­i­ty of all pack­ag­ing is still being sent to land­fill or for incin­er­a­tion, releas­ing green­house gas­es into the atmos­phere or find­ing its way into the envi­ron­ment and ecosys­tems.

While view­ing the dynam­ic as an oppo­si­tion­al com­posta­bles ver­sus recy­clables par­a­digm is out­dat­ed, con­sid­er­able progress must be made with both sus­tain­able pack­ag­ing solu­tions before they realise their true poten­tial.

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