Why ditching plastic is not the answer

Unnec­es­sary plas­tic waste remains a key con­trib­u­tor to cli­mate change and it is unde­ni­able that more must be done to tack­le the issue to pro­tect our plan­et from fur­ther dam­age.

How­ev­er, sus­tain­abil­i­ty with­in pack­ag­ing is com­plex and can­not be neat­ly solved by sim­ply swap­ping plas­tic for an alter­na­tive mate­r­i­al. There are many fac­tors that need to be con­sid­ered when deter­min­ing whether a prod­uct offers a tru­ly eco-friend­ly solu­tion.

It can be easy to for­get that plas­tic is often incor­po­rat­ed into pack­ag­ing to per­form an impor­tant role: to pro­tect the prod­uct inside. This is par­tic­u­lar­ly impor­tant in indus­tries such as the food and phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal sec­tors, where min­imis­ing waste that could have a dam­ag­ing impact on the envi­ron­ment is key.

Any mate­r­i­al that is used to replace plas­tic in pack­ag­ing for per­ish­able prod­ucts must offer the same pro­tec­tive qual­i­ties or the pur­pose is entire­ly defeat­ed.

Considering the whole life cycle of materials

The life cycle of mate­ri­als must also be con­sid­ered. Throw­away plas­tic pack­ag­ing makes up 40 per cent of our demand for the mate­r­i­al, with two thirds of plas­tic pro­duced being released into the envi­ron­ment and stay­ing there. This is clear­ly not sus­tain­able.

How­ev­er, the solu­tion is more con­vo­lut­ed than sim­ply replac­ing plas­tic with a mate­r­i­al that is per­ceived to be “green”. In recent years we have seen a move towards reusable pack­ag­ing, with retail­ers such as Wait­rose and Lush intro­duc­ing refill­able pack­ag­ing options in their stores.

It’s impor­tant that we weigh up the cre­den­tials of a recy­clable solu­tion against pack­ag­ing that can be used hun­dreds, or even thou­sands, of times over to estab­lish what tru­ly offers the most envi­ron­men­tal­ly friend­ly solu­tion.

Final­ly, and per­haps most impor­tant­ly, it is essen­tial the car­bon used to pro­duce a prod­uct is con­sid­ered before we make judg­ments on whether a mate­r­i­al is gen­uine­ly sus­tain­able. Plas­tic remains among the most ener­gy-inten­sive mate­ri­als to make and many alter­na­tives offer a far more car­bon-effi­cient alter­na­tive.

But to deter­mine which mate­ri­als are tru­ly sus­tain­able, we must look at the big­ger pic­ture and con­sid­er the amount of car­bon that is used at every point of the sup­ply chain. For exam­ple, if a com­pa­ny cre­ates a paper alter­na­tive that weighs more than their orig­i­nal plas­tic pack­ag­ing, they have twice as much mate­r­i­al to pro­duce, trans­port and dis­pose of at the end of its life, all of which comes at a high cost for the envi­ron­ment.

Plastic can still be a sustainable choice

It’s a com­plex and mul­ti­fac­eted equa­tion, but one that must be con­sid­ered if we are to move towards a car­bon-effi­cient world.

Justin Kemp­son, direc­tor of sales and inno­va­tion at Charpak, says: ‘’Research shows the entire life-cycle car­bon foot­print of recy­cled plas­tics is the least impact­ful. Plas­tics must become cir­cu­lar to pre­vent pack­ag­ing waste. Exist­ing resources must be recov­ered and reused to reduce new mate­ri­als pro­duc­tion. Where pack­ag­ing is nec­es­sary, a cir­cu­lar mod­el is the most sus­tain­able solu­tion, with a far low­er car­bon impact, no mat­ter which mate­r­i­al.’’

At the last edi­tion of our Pack­ag­ing Inno­va­tions show in Birm­ing­ham, 20 per cent of vis­i­tors said they were look­ing for sus­tain­able design, but 32 per cent said they look for biodegrad­able plas­tics. Plas­tic can still be the mate­r­i­al of choice; it’s about where it has come from and what hap­pens to it after use.

The shift in focus away from demon­is­ing plas­tic and towards cre­at­ing pack­ag­ing that is tru­ly sus­tain­able through­out its life cycle can be felt across the entire indus­try and will con­tin­ue to take cen­tre stage despite the oth­er chal­lenges 2020 has brought us.

It is an intri­cate and chal­leng­ing prob­lem that will require the whole sup­ply chain, both for pack­ag­ing and the prod­ucts inside, to work togeth­er and focus on deliv­er­ing solu­tions for the right rea­sons. It has become much more appar­ent that we are fight­ing a war on waste, not on plas­tic.