WASTE NOT -
A circular economy for plastics is achievable in our lifetime, though it will require consumers and manufacturers to work together. Whether companies decide to keep it in-house or partner with like-minded third parties, an investment in our future now will lead to more profitable operations and create relentless forward progress.
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While recycling and lightweighting packaging strategies are helpful, they still align more with a linear rather than circular economy. Here, Upstream CEO Matt Prindiville lays out his organization’s vision for a truly plastic waste-free future.
CHEMISTRY, MATERIALS & PACKAGING -
Protein Evolution’s technology can turn unused polyester and nylon fabrics from Stella McCartney’s previous collections into good-as-new, infinitely recyclable fibers — and could present a new circular solution for the fashion industry.
CHEMISTRY, MATERIALS & PACKAGING -
Orange Fiber and Keel Labs are platforms for exploration and innovation that can reverberate across the fashion industry and prove that sustainable feedstocks and production processes can create both financial and planetary prosperity.
CHEMISTRY, MATERIALS & PACKAGING -
Developing and optimizing a fully circular plastics value chain is a complex challenge that can’t be achieved with any single solution. We challenge our peers and other key stakeholders to be courageous and take risks, to explore new possibilities and partnerships, and persist until we have solutions.
FROM PURPOSE TO ACTION: BUILDING A SUSTAINABLE FUTURE TOGETHER -
While flexible packaging plays an important role in keeping food fresher longer, it has long been difficult to recycle. Designing more recyclable flexible packaging from the start and determining a better end-of-life process for current materials is a vital step in reducing food waste.
COLLABORATION -
The joint effort from WM and Dow aims to provide a solution to make it easier for households to recycle the film while the companies explore new options to
reuse it. When fully implemented, the program is expected to prevent 120,000 tons of plastic film from reaching landfills each year.
CHEMISTRY, MATERIALS & PACKAGING -
As seen in ongoing incidents of greenwashing and a new Greenpeace report, the onus is on consumer product manufacturers to take more comprehensive approaches to stemming their flow of plastic into the world — and turning the tide of public opinion.
PRODUCT, SERVICE & DESIGN INNOVATION -
Archireef has developed the world’s first-ever biomimetic, artificial reef tile — promoting coral survivorship and growth in an environmentally friendly, adaptive and scalable way.
CHEMISTRY, MATERIALS & PACKAGING -
The USDA has awarded Bridgestone $35M to grow its investment in desert shrub guayule to advance a climate-smart domestic rubber industry and offer a water-smart solution amid the ongoing drought in the Southwestern US.
CHEMISTRY, MATERIALS & PACKAGING -
The Brazilian cookware giant released its first comprehensive sustainability and environmental impact review, detailing its progress toward and ongoing pursuit of sustainability.
CHEMISTRY, MATERIALS & PACKAGING -
Men’s apparel startup HyperNatural is aiming to subvert the industry’s reliance on synthetic materials with its unique fabric made from a blend of recycled and organic waste streams. While it’s still ironing out circularity kinks, the brand is determined to not make perfection the enemy of progress.
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On a practical level, we simply cannot recycle our way out of the damage that plastic waste is doing to our world, our environment and ourselves. That’s why it's time to consider uncycling — or reducing our use of single-use plastics down to zero.
COLLABORATION -
Klean Kanteen, MiiR, Stanley and YETI have partnered to reduce emissions and establish science-based targets across their manufacturing supply chains.
WASTE NOT -
Key recommendations failed to understand plastic pollution from a holistic perspective — placing too much blame on the five most impacted Asian countries and suggesting carbon-heavy options for disposal.
FROM PURPOSE TO ACTION: BUILDING A SUSTAINABLE FUTURE TOGETHER -
In Latin America, where recycling rates remain below 10%, grassroots circular solutions are slowly beginning to scale — thanks to growing legitimacy, education, organization and protections for informal waste workers, who remain the backbone of the region’s collection and recycling infrastructure.