Sustainable Packaging
- Meera Naveen
- Mar 19, 2023
- 2 min read
Updated: Jun 24, 2024
When you think of converting to sustainability, what suddenly comes to mind might be this:
Less food wasting
Greener Energy Use/Saving Energy
Providing pure water for third - world countries
Buying Animal - Friendly products
But what you sometimes might not think of is this: sustainable packaging.
Especially when opening a business, you might want to market and sell all your fabulous items, whether it's food, furniture, fashion, or whatnot.
Some ideas you might want to start with as a consumer are these:
Buy things in bulk packaging. Bulk packaging usually uses less material than individual packaging, and provides more products at the same time.
When taking home restaurant food, try to use the least amount of containers as possible, and fill each to its capacity.
Okay, now you have in mind some ways to reduce the amount of packaging, let's get to the main topic: greener and more sustainable packaging.
Types of cleaner packaging:
Recycled/reused cardboard. Cardboard is very commonly used when it comes to packaging items such as shipments from Amazon and such. But using recycled/reused cardboard, especially pointing out to the consumer to reuse/recycle it, is especially good to help reduce the amount of material you're using and the number of trees you're felling. Corrugated cardboard is especially good for this. Packing paper is also good.
Any good material that is reused, recycled, or -able of that sort is good. From reusable/recyclable plastic yogurt cups to recycled Amazon boxes, material that is able to be turned into something new or used again and again is a good example of sustainable packaging.
Bioplastics and mushroom packaging. Mushroom packaging comes from mushroom mycelium, which means that this versatile, sustainable plastic does come from mushrooms. In the processing, it uses less than 50% of energy and carbon dioxide compared to plastics and is completely compostable. Companies such as BioFab, Magical Mushroom Company, and Ecovative use it. Bioplastics are more in general, types being Cellulose, Protein, Organic, Aliphatic, and Starch Polyesters.
Compostable mailers. In the form of bags, envelopes, etc., these mailers are indeed biodegradable. From KTOB to HanzOn, there are many companies that provide these alternatives to regular plastic packaging.
- Another company that provides packaging materials and others is If You Care, completely recyclable and chemical - free.
So, to conclude, there are many ways to access clean, sustainable packaging, whether it's recyclable, chemical - free, and/or compostable. Adding this to your sustainable home is a great place to start in your environmental journey.
Works Cited:
Images From Wix
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