How can we get the benefits of plastic without the pollution?

This post was written by Nick Cliffe and first appeared on The ReLondon blog for Circular Economy London Week 2021

There’s no one point at which you could say ‘plastic packaging’ was invented, but one pivotal moment took place in a French café in 1904 when a Swiss Chemist called Dr Jacques Brandenberger watched another patron spill a bottle of red wine and ruin a fresh linen tablecloth. Brandenberger was an innovator, a specialist in developing new methods of dyeing, printing and finishing cloth. He saw an opportunity. Could he develop a splash-proof coating for linen, a product his employers could sell, and his employers’ customers could enjoy the cost savings on laundry, labour and replacement?

After some intensive research, he found himself experimenting with applying a substance called viscose to linen, which although it gave good results refused to stick, and would peel off in long, transparent sheets. But, as sometimes happens in innovation, this failed coating was the origin of cellophane (which was named from the Greek for ‘see-through-wood’ as viscose was made from wood pulp).

After some further research and development cellophane would go on to revolutionise packaging for food and other products. It was lightweight, it was strong. It was functional in that it could resist moisture, it was transparent so you could see what you were buying, it protected and preserved food and it was, relatively, cheap. All characteristics which could be used to describe the properties of the more recent plastics widely used in packaging today.

The scale of the problem

Last month, researchers at the University of Cadiz, led by Dr Carmen Morales, published the results of their work examining records from studies detailing over 12 million pieces of litter found in rivers, oceans, on the shore and the seafloor. Eighty per cent of the pieces were made of plastic — and nearly half of these plastic pieces were from packaging, most of which was packaging for the food and drink we consume.

We are still in the early days of understanding the effects and impacts of this astonishing scale of pollution. We may never truly comprehend all the consequences of what our extensive use of synthetic polymers could be. But we are at least on that journey now and making some progress.

Our modern global supply chains rely heavily on the incredible properties and functionality of packaging. If the ISO standard shipping container is the building block of modern global supply chains, then plastic packaging is perhaps the mortar that binds them together.

And therein lies the challenge. Plastic is so incredibly versatile and effective as a packaging material that if it didn’t exist, we’d almost have to invent it.

But all those qualities which make it ideal also lead to the huge problems most recently described by Dr Morales and her team.

Its strength and durability mean it’s a very persistent pollutant. Its relative cheapness means it’s both ubiquitous and not as valuable (and hence worth collecting) as materials like aluminium. Its wide degree of functionality — achieved by mixing different plastics and other materials — make it very complicated to recycle even if you can collect it.

All this means that if we want to continue to enjoy the benefits of plastic and minimise the impacts on the environment, we need a sustainable plastic packaging supply chain.

Not-plastic, and new plastic from old: how innovations are tackling the problem

At UK Research & Innovation our role is to support businesses and researchers to develop new ideas for products and services. In the Smart Sustainable Plastic Packaging Challenge, our focus is on how we can develop the next generation of materials, products, technologies and business models that will deliver all the benefits of today’s plastic packaging whilst minimising or eliminating the negative environmental impacts.

We are supporting innovation in reduction and refill, companies like Caulibox or Unpackaged. Even though refill models are hundreds of years old there is still a lot we need to learn and test to make them work in our modern consumer society.

We are supporting material innovation, companies like NotPLA and Oceanium, who are making new materials that can fulfil specific functions but are intended not to persist if they do escape into the environment.

We are supporting recycling innovation, companies like ReNEW and Impact Recycling, who are making the next generation of recycling processes that can help improve the range of plastic waste we can recycle and the commercial viability of doing it.

These and many other projects will help address the problem of plastic pollution, should deliver a more circular outcome for plastic packaging and could even address the challenge to reach net zero. Not bad for something that started with a tablecloth!

Want to know more?

If you’re a UK taxpayer, your contributions have helped fund this work, via UK Research and Innovation - the funding body that allocates government funds for research - and the nine associated research councils. You can read more about what we do here. And if you liked this article, follow us on Medium, Instagram, Facebook or YouTube — or sign up for our climate change newsletter!

Nick Cliffe is Deputy Challenge Director for the Smart Sustainable Plastic Packaging Challenge. Learn more about SSPP at https://www.ukri.org/our-work/our-main-funds/industrial-strategy-challenge-fund/clean-growth/smart-sustainable-plastic-packaging-challenge/