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Packaging is the next frontier of living sustainably. In 2018 82 million pieces of packaging materials was created and only 53.8% was recycled. Yet, recently big brands have been changing their plastic wrapping ways to offer recyclable paper or package-free solutions. Still, there is a lot that has to be done in terms of education for both brands and the consumer about how packaging is affecting our planet and what the best packaging solutions are. For instance, did you know that some of those paper containers actually aren’t recyclable at all? The Wellness Feed reached out to zero waste expert Nicole Pamani who shared a few surprising facts about paper containers and offered recycling tips to help us learn how to dispose of excess packaging better.
| Nicole Pamani is a circular economy consultant with 9+ years of experience working with small businesses, brands and nonprofits to find sustainable solutions. To learn more about her take on sustainability tune in to her web series Do What You Can For the People dedicated to sustainability, entrepreneurship, and mental health.|
How would you describe the term ‘zero waste’?
The Zero Waste movement’s goal is to send nothing to landfills. Sending materials to landfills doesn’t make sense just to take up space and contribute to global emissions – it wastes all the resources (raw materials, energy, water, etc.) that went into producing it. There is value in those resources, and part of the zero waste movement is recognizing that value and trying to extend its life.
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Whenever possible, refuse packaging altogether – for example, going to the grocery store and bringing a reusable bag instead of using a plastic produce bag.
The next step would be to reduce packaging – sticking to the theme of going grocery shopping, this could mean buying a family size bag of chips instead of a 6-pack of snack bags.
Then we come to reuse – so reusing plastic containers or glass jars for food storage falls under this.
Is recyclable packaging zero waste?
Yes, recyclable packaging or packaging made from recycled materials do count as progress toward that goal. However, most of us circular economy nerds would argue that it should be a last resort. The circular economy pushes for refuse, reduce, and reuse before recycling. Of course, we can’t all be expected to hoard hundreds of bottles and jars in our kitchens, and much of the packaging we encounter in the world isn’t designed for reuse. So we ultimately arrive at recycling, which is most certainly a better option than sending the materials to landfill.
What packaging materials should consumers look for when shopping?
If you can’t refuse or reduce, I recommend looking for packaging that is made from a single material, and ideally can be reused over and over again. Talenti jars are probably my favorite example – yes, they are plastic, but I reuse mine as food storage containers for years before eventually recycling them.
You might think I’m crazy for choosing a plastic container over an ice cream carton, but in most municipalities ice cream cartons aren’t recyclable. Traditional ice cream cartons are made primarily from paperboard, but include a plastic lining to ensure that the paperboard doesn’t break down in your freezer or leak when your ice cream gets melty. This plastic lining is water resistant, and therefore cannot be processed by paper recycling centers that use water to create recycled paper pulp. Recycling systems vary from municipality to municipality, but generally speaking single-material packaging is much more easily processed than multi-material packaging.
How can we properly dispose of packaging materials?
The first step is to check your municipality’s recycling rules. Every municipality has different rules around what is accepted and how to properly sort your recycling.
The next step is to make sure that your recyclables are clean. For plastic or glass packaging, this means washing them thoroughly. For cardboard or paper products, this means no food residue or grease stains. Additionally, you want to do your best to make sure that your cardboard stays dry – wet cardboard tends to clog up automated sorting machines. Throwing wet cardboard into your recycling bin risks damaging other cardboard/paper products and making the whole lot unusable.
What are the challenges that brands face when it comes to adopting zero waste packaging?
I think the biggest challenge is the fragmented system and lack of consumer education. The fact that every municipality is different means that there is no universal material that will work everywhere. Recently, there has been a push toward compostable packaging, but many composting facilities don’t accept it. Unless you are backyard composting on your own, you don’t have access to a stream to properly dispose of the packaging. You can’t even recycle it, so it ends up going to landfill. Worse yet, if the consumer ‘wish-cycles’ the packaging (throws into their recycling because eh maybe it’ll get recycled), and it ends up at a recycling center that does not have the resources to sort through everything… your entire load of recyclables is deemed contaminated and sent to landfill. The act of wish-cycling or wish-composting actually makes things much worse.
The next biggest challenge is probably cost and access. If we look at reusable packaging models like Loop Store that have truly embodied the zero waste packaging movement, we can see that the cost to provide packaging as a service is much higher. This is because the brand has a higher upfront cost to invest in more durable packaging for products and must also absorb the cost of reverse logistics to collect the packaging at end of use. Unfortunately, sustainability tends to come at a premium at the moment, which in turns makes it less accessible to mass markets.
The last challenge to consider is around product safety and branding. Two of the main purposes of packaging is to keep it safe during transportation and to showcase branding and marketing materials. As more brands consider going package-free or launching ‘naked’ products, we need to consider other tiers of packaging that will protect it as its moved across the supply chain. Additionally, brands will need to think about how to deliver important information about the product and their company to consumers (e.g. expiration dates, warning labels, ingredients, etc.).
What brands do you admire for their zero waste packaging initiatives?
Loop Store and Limeloop are two standouts for me when considering packaging-as-a-service models. Lush has done a great job at making many of their products packaging free. Imperfect Foods is another brand that has done really well in not only reducing the amount of packaging they use, but creating a system to recover a good deal of that packaging. Algramo, Blueland and, Kjaer Weiss are great examples of refillable models.
How do you minimize waste in your personal life?
Lots of seemingly little actions. Some things that come to mind are that I make sure I take my reusable totes and produce bags to the grocery store, compost 85% of my food waste, reuse food containers as much as possible before recycling them, buy package-free personal care and household items, use microfiber cloths for cleaning, and try to shop local instead of online as much as possible. But these are all changes that I made slowly over time – I’m still using a roll of paper towels that I’ve had for 3 months before investing in unpaper towels. I’m human – I still order takeout every now and again, only to clean and recycle the food containers that can’t be reused.
I think a lot of people might be intimidated or overwhelmed by the Zero Waste movement without realizing that it’s more of a journey than a complete lifestyle overhaul. Reducing waste in any way counts as progress towards that collective goal. One of my favorite quotes is “We need lots of people doing zero waste imperfectly more than we need a few people doing zero waste perfectly.” I hope this inspires people to take one small step towards living a lower impact life.
