Can Biodegradable Packaging Significantly Reduce Your Company's Emissions?

In the ongoing quest for sustainability, especially within the food and beverage industry, the role of packaging stands out as a critical area of focus. While biodegradable and alternative packaging materials offer hope, it's essential to dive deeper into their true environmental costs and benefits. Overall, we find that alternative packaging including biopolymers, mycelium-based packaging, and other recycled and upcycled alternatives can provide a positive impact for specific types of companies, however, there are usually more impactful or less expensive options you may want to consider first.  

For companies in the consumer goods sector, especially those producing packaged food, beverages, personal care, or household products, packaging isn’t often the largest emissions contributor, but can be an easy place to implement solutions. 

Packaging Alternatives in the Industry

Packaging plays a crucial role in the protection, transportation, and marketing of products. However, traditional packaging materials, such as single-use petroleum-based plastics and paper/board products, have raised environmental concerns due to their non-biodegradable nature and non-renewable resource-intensive production processes. Recognizing these challenges, the industry is shifting towards what are perceived to be more sustainable alternatives. Let's delve into some of the most innovative sustainable packaging options being adopted in the industry today.

The Benefits

The benefits of alternative packaging should also be carefully considered and evaluated along with potential tradeoffs, including:

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The Biopolymer Dilemma

Biopolymers have been lauded for their potential benefits to the environment, human health, and marine ecosystems. They are derived from renewable sources and can degrade more naturally, reducing risks associated with traditional plastics, especially in marine environments. However, the production of biopolymers presents challenges. Processes like dewatering, chemical treatment, and heating are energy-intensive, often making the environmental footprint of biopolymers comparable to, if not greater than, fossil fuel-based polymers.

There are other tradeoffs to consider as well. First, the production of biopolymers can sometimes require significant agricultural resources, potentially competing with food crops and leading to land use changes. This might result in indirect environmental impacts, such as deforestation and biodiversity loss. Additionally, while some biopolymers are biodegradable, not all degrade quickly or fully in natural environments, especially if specific composting conditions are not met. 

On the economic side, biopolymers can be more expensive than conventional plastics, impacting the cost structure for businesses and potentially the end prices for consumers. Alternative packaging solutions, such as glass or metal, might offer longer durability and reusability, but they come with their own environmental and economic challenges, like increased energy consumption during production and transportation due to their weight. For context, our studies found varied emissions for different packaging materials.  We assessed one biopolymer (PHA), paper, and polypropylene (a conventional polymer widely used in packaging). Overall our results found that the bio-based polymer had the highest emissions whereas the conventional material had the lowest. 

Beyond Packaging: More Direct Solutions

Packaging is one piece of the broader sustainability picture. Companies can implement a wide range of strategies and tactics that can have equal if not more direct impact. 

1. Switch Ingredients: Opting for less emissions intense, more plant-based ingredients can dramatically reduce the overall environmental impact. This is because ingredients typically make up anywhere between 30% to 90% of a food and beverage company’s impact, as emissions factors of food can vary significantly.‍
2. Switch Providers: Partnering with suppliers committed to sustainable practices, such as regenerative agriculture, can make a significant difference. Planet FWD’s platform can help you quantify the impacts of these decisions, so data can help drive your choices.
3. ‍Adopt Sustainable Practices: From water conservation to waste reduction, adopting greener practices in-house can further reduce a company's carbon footprint.  This can be done through a wide range of strategies such as: increasing efficiency, reducing electric and natural gas use, investing in renewables, and purchasing renewable energy credits.‍
4. Bulk Packaging and Refill Stations: Encouraging consumers to refill their containers reduces the need for single-use packaging. You may have seen some grocery and specialty stores offer bulk product sections where customers can fill their containers, saving on new packaging while keeping existing packaging in use.
5. ‍Light weighting PackagingReducing the amount of packaging used for products not only conserves resources but also reduces waste. Apple is known for its minimalist packaging designs, using fewer materials while ensuring product safety, which not only saves the earth’s resources but also increases shipping efficiency
6. ‍Returnable and Reusable Packaging: Some companies have adopted systems where customers can return packaging for it to be cleaned, sterilized, and reused, like Loop, a shopping platform that collaborates with big brands to offer products in reusable containers.‍

Evaluating Your Product’s Impact to Find the Top Emissions Drivers

While the spotlight often shines on packaging as a key contributor to corporate emissions, it's essential to recognize that it's just one piece of a multifaceted sustainability puzzle. Companies must consider a broad spectrum of interventions, with many impactful steps potentially preceding packaging changes in the hierarchy of emissions reduction strategies.

Biopolymers and other alternative packaging, though promising, come with their own set of challenges and tradeoffs. They can be more expensive than traditional materials, and their production can demand energy-intensive processes that counteract their environmental benefits. However,  biopolymers and other sustainable packaging advantages can extend beyond just climate metrics. Biopolymers can offer significant benefits in terms of biodegradability, reduced toxicity, and overall environmental resilience. 

A Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is a comprehensive tool to evaluate the environmental impact of your product from your ingredients to production and packaging, all the way through your product’s end of life. LCAs that take a rigorous, scientifically grounded analysis can help businesses truly understand the environmental implications of all their supply chain choices, and see how best it can be reduced - whether that’s through packaging or otherwise. 

In the journey toward sustainability, understanding the bigger picture is key, and we're here to help you bring the bigger picture into focus.