Materials & Packaging

The latest developments in materials, feedstocks and processes that are transforming the way many conventional products are made and packaged — and eliminating their negative impacts

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EPA, Unilever Partnering to Advance Non-Animal Methods of Chemical Risk Assessment

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and Unilever have announced a research collaboration to develop groundbreaking scientific approaches to better assess the safety of chemicals found in some consumer products without using animal data.The... View More

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Could Sugar-Embedded Products Help Us Survive in a World Ravaged by Drought?

Climate impacts already cost billions in economic damage each year. Global drought losses are expected to surpass $8 billion in 2015 alone. A 2010 study by the National Centre for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) predicted that extreme drought will threat... View More

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Sustainability Mythbusters: Are Bio-Based Products Always Preferable to Oil-Based?

The common viewIn times where concerns over depletion of non-renewable resources and climate change are drastically increasing, it seems easy to accept that bio-based products are without a doubt better than fuel-based products. ... View More

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Can't Give Up the Bottle? Try Boxed Water

Plastic bottles are some of the worst offenders in packaging waste, but sales of bottled water continue to grow: U.S. bottled water volume apparently rose 7 percent last year. ... View More

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Trending: 'Freaky Friday' Technologies Grow Metal, Create Batteries from Trees

We know from the emerging discipline of biomimicry that natural systems can stimulate sustainable designs for human use. Two recent innovations use trees for inspiration and materials in unconventional products that may revolutionize very different i... View More

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Texas Teen Develops $20 Water Purifier to Fight E-Waste Pollution

Eighteen-year-old Perry Alagappan of Texas has created a renewable heavy metal filter capable of removing 99 percent of heavy metals from water that passes through it, The Guardian reports.This could be particularly useful in countries such as China ... View More

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How Marketing and Social Action Can Bring Back Recycling

A cloud seems to be looming over the recycling industry today. No matter where you turn, the reigning attitude seems about the same — the future of recycling is in trouble. ... View More

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Trending: Sustainability Demand Spurs New Packaging Innovations

A recent report from Transparency Market Research revealed that sustainability awareness is driving the demand for paper packaging. Paper is the largest material type in the packaging market and is growing, since it is both economically and environme... View More

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Seventh Generation Detergents Join Target’s ‘Made to Matter’ Collection

Seventh Generation, which makes eco-friendly household and personal care products, on Monday launched a new line of laundry and dishwasher detergents designed to save consumers energy and money, while also helping to protect and care for the environm... View More

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Trending: Biobased Microbeads, Flexible Foams Could Offer Renewable Materials for Hundreds of Products

TerraVerdae BioWorks, an industrial biotechnology company developing advanced bioplastics and environmentally sustainable biomaterials, announced Monday that it has successfully achieved key milestones for the commercial production for its line of Po... View More

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Researchers Unveil New Method for Converting Greenhouse Gas to Building Material

This week, researchers at George Washington University (GWU) unveiled a new method to convert carbon dioxide into nanoscale carbon fibers that may serve as valuable future building materials (think: aircrafts, fitness equipment and sports cars), as w... View More

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Could Genetically Modified Algae Replace Petroleum in Plastic?

Conventional plastic — found just about everywhere you can think of and in many places you wouldn’t — is made from ethylene, a cheap hydrocarbon made using petroleum and natural gas – through a process that emits more carbon dioxide than any ... View More

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Trending: Clay-Based Concrete, Upcycled Waste Latest Innovations in Sustainable Building Materials

The days of conventional concrete and carbon-intensive building materials are waning. ... View More

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Brazilian Design Students 'Re-Pack Milk' with Easily Recyclable Container

Until we achieve widespread optimization of industrial materials use (quite a few years off, yet), recycling is still our best option for retaining value and extending the life of those materials.Not one of the better examples of this, modern milk ca... View More

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Kodak Opens Facility For Zero-Water, Zero-Chemical, Low-Energy Print Solution

Kodak today opened a new manufacturing line at its Columbus, Georgia facility that will produce its KODAK SONORA Process Free Plates. Kodak says SONORA Process Free Plates deliver the productivity, quality and print capabilities of mainstream process... View More

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16-Year-Old Scientist Finds Scalable Solution to Pharmaceutical Pollution in Water

For many of us, our high school science fair likely involved creative experimentation that may have yielded one more baking soda and vinegar volcano. Not so for 16-year-old Maria Elena Grimmett, a student at the Oxbridge Academy of the Palm Beaches i... View More

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BASF, thinkstep Scaling Collaborative Approach to Sustainable Product Portfolios: Part 2

At SB ’15 San Diego last month, chemical giant BASF and sustainability software and consulting company thinkstep announced their collaboration in making BASF’s Sustainable Solution SteeringTM method — for management of, and transition to, a sus... View More

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P&G Fabric Care Overhauling Packaging to Make 230M Bottles a Year from Recycled Plastic

Procter & Gamble (P&G) Fabric Care has announced a new initiative that will see 230 million bottles of flagship brands such as Ariel, Dash, Lenor and Unstopables made out of Post-Consumer Recyclate (PCR — aka recycled packaging). If laid ou... View More

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Trending: Coca-Cola, Liquid Light, Monadnock Advancing Sustainable Packaging Technologies

The Coca-Cola Company has launched a development agreement with Liquid Light, a technology company focused on converting carbon dioxide into major industrial chemicals, to accelerate production of mono-ethylene glycol (MEG) – a component used to ma... View More

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New Genomatica-Cargill Collaboration Will Bring More Renewable Chemicals to Market

Sustainable chemical technology company Genomatica announced today it has partnered with Cargill to accelerate the production of renewable chemicals for industrial applications. The collaboration will give chemical producers, distributors and users a... View More

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