The problem with the popularity of pouches
TerraCycle’s food packaging recycling programs began with drink pouches. Those programs have expanded from Capri Sun and Honest Kids drink pouches, to Flavia Fresh Packs, Sprout baby food pouches, and Method Cleaner Refill packs. Clif Family Winery is soon launching a Brigade for their Climber Wine Pouches and other wine pouch packaging. Nowadays, pouches are in every aisle of every big-box retailer. They’re convenient, durable, lightweight, affordable, an all around “win”… that is until it is time to recycle them.
As a packaging professional and recycling expert, I am experiencing serious cognitive dissonance over the almighty pouch. The environmental 3 R’s - Reduce, Reuse, Recycle - are in that order for a reason. It is better for the planet to reduce than it is to reuse, which is better than recycling. By using a pouch, we are drastically reducing packaging weight; for example, Kenco’s Eco-Refill Packs have 97 percent less packaging weight and Method’s new refill packs use (on average) 83 percent less plastic, water and energy.
Still, I know that despite these savings, these pouches aren’t recyclable, which means they’ll end up in a landfill or incinerated. As both an environmentalist and businessman, I am divided. Does the social good your customer feels get erased when they have to toss out that pouch? Recyclability is just one aspect to focus on when choosing packaging for a product, whether it be laundry detergent, soaps, food, drink, etc. Pouches are popular for good reasons, and since they’re not likely to go away soon, the question arises: to whom does the onus of solving this packaging problem fall? Should packaging professionals try to find other, more easily recyclable packaging to use? Can pouches be made from a single polymer like PP or PET so they can be recycled? Or should municipal recyclers try to find a solution that can be widely implemented?
The fact that pouches are popular across the world (not just for juice but also for things like crackers, nuts, detergents, baking ingredients and even cat food), and that people worldwide are seeking a solution, speaks to the breadth and depth of the problem. Everyone is looking for an answer.
There’s living proof that the pouches can be recycled–and it’s not just TerraCycle that can do this. While TerraCycle shreds and melts and pelletizes, there are also co-ops that make woven bags across the world. TerraCycle is working in Argentina, Brazil, Mexico, Canada, and the U.S. to solve the pouch problem. In the Philippines, drink pouches are incredibly popular, and they’re made into “doy bags” (similar to tote bags) so that they don’t end up littering the streets.
When we know they can be recycled, one answer is clear: There’s no excuse for them to end up in the landfill. Right now, private recyclers handle the bulk of this waste stream because most recyclers are not setup to take pouches. A similar challenge exists with wax-coated cartons. In 2008, only 18 percent of U.S. households had access to carton recycling programs. Today, thanks in part to the Carton Council (www.recyclecartons.com), this number has more than doubled to nearly 37 percent, but that still means that only one-third of Americans can recycle their milk and juice cartons. While not enough, it is far outreaches the ability to recycle pouches.
Since the use of pouches is widespread, should packaging professionals make the pouches more easily recyclable, or should municipal recyclers expand programs and technologies to include pouches in municipal recycling? How could they work together (perhaps with private recyclers) to do this? As a nod to the Carton Council it could be called the Pouch Partnership.
The easy answer to that question: All parties should be making great efforts to integrate and come up with a solution. I want to hear what you all think as packaging professionals. What’s the best way to make this happen? How do we approach this solvable problem?
Aggku commented:
Design wise I really enjoy the 1st and secnod designs.I like the idea of a game on recycling but do you really have to tell it you recycled to play?Also since there are many different types of plastics and paper, you could text their knowledge of what types of plastic can be recycled, Number 1, number 7 etc (you know that symbol on plastic cans that has the three arrows in a triangle around it, has different numbers in it, those categorize what plastics can be recycled)If this is a game or a app based on someone saying that they recycled, then more than likely users will abuse the app. Especially if you can cash in points for prizes, Maybe the points go towards an online game that you can play too? or something like that?I like the concept, but I’m not sure that this is really in-depth enough this far into the project to really be worth making an app on.??? ()
chemicalmatt commented:
THe recycling processes used in municipalities across the U.S. (and the world) could be readily modified to accept and recycle flexible film. The hurdle still lurking is in the multi-layered laminate construction that is both the beauty and the beast of this packaging medium. TerraCycle has just developed technology to deal with this, but it is proprietary and not widespread. Certainly a monolayer flexible structure would help us reach our goal, and PETE is the strongest candidate to date, but polymer chemistry still has a way to go to match the barrier attributes of the multilayer with a monolayer.
Heal commented:
These are so cute! Abby Sue loves to sew do you think it would be sioethmng she could attempt? She loves making gifts for her friends these are perfect!
E=mc2 commented:
If these pouches aren’t recyclable, why is that? The article states “there’s living proof that pouches can be recycled”. It’s simple. The recyclers of the world are not innovating. Anything can be recycled, the laws of physics have proven that.
Lisa McTigue Pierce commented:
Tom, great post. Thank you!
There has been a lot of recent activity in end-of-life options for flexible packaging, including waste-to-energy (WTE) incineration, upcycling (as you well know!) and, most intriguing IMO, recycling. Will it work, considering that so many flexible packages are deliberately engineered (laminated or coextruded - few are single material) to provide specific characteristics/benefits?
It’s good for packaging professionals to keep up with viable existing, as well as future-looking, options.
Nova commented:
Pouches should be made better along with many other things in our world. Products should not be born with inherent waste stream problems. These birth defects should be resolved with in product development so in this case using a single plastic such as PP will prevent problems down stream. The energy it takes to deal with design defects will always be more costly, financially and environmentally, than making things better.
Eric commented:
Tom,
Municipal recyclers need to implement a system to collect and process multi-layer films. Packaging engineers use film laminates and different polymers to accomplish many things including product preservation, print quality, and machine runability among others. Often if you remove one of these layer components your product, brand, or manufacturing process could suffer. Sure, mono-layer films make for cleaner pellets that can be used in more post-consumer recycle applications, but a mono-layer technology that accomplishes all these critical to quality measurements does not exist. Now, even if you had a mono-layer solution, you still need convenient access to a film collection location and a system to process it in to post-consumer recycled material.
Private recyclers like your company have figured out how to collect and recycle multi-layer film laminations for use in creating new products that have value. So, you know the technology exists. In order to expand collection across the US, you need municipal recyclers to jump on board. Some will be resistent because of the additional time and resources necesary to build a better system. Nevertheless, to encourage municipal recyclers to expand their capabilities you need to help local governments and communities think about the painful result of sending all the film packaging that exists today to the landfill. In contrast, you need to help people think about the missed opportunity all that waste represents and the positive change that would result if we had a recycle solution for film in the US. Similar to your Pouch Partnership idea… a group like this should raise the level of awareness and serve as a unified voice to encourage development and implementation of a recycling program for multi-layer films. Use social media to gain followers, leverage public events, add a PR campaign, and create a media stir - the more organizations and people behind you the better. Then, target the message directly to municipal recyclers in the US and see what happens… a story of contrast can be a powerful thing.
- Eric
Sébastien FILY commented:
Pouches could be incinarated. The ‘oil-based’ part of it replaces the fuel or the charcoal we may need to heat water in these incineration/heating center. The residus of these combustions are then called machefer that could potentially be used for road construction. But machefer can contain up to 8 times more dioxins than the fumes generated in these valorisation center. So incinaration of pouches may not be the middle to long term solution. What we should consider is that burning pouches instead of rigid containers will generate 83 to 97% of waste reduction (considering the numbers in Tom’s article) : so this is nevertheless better and a consequent upgrade of the situation!
SF
