Bio-polymers, recycling, disposal, etc.

            There are all kinds of pressures encouraging everybody to go green but the whole area is fraught with confusion.  One example of this is in the area of biodegradable polymers.  The aim of a biodegradable polymer is that when it is disposed of it goes into a compost heap or digester so that it can be broken down quickly.  This is not the same as it being discarded and ending up in a landfill site.  Landfill disposal will mean that the polymer is likely still to be identifiable for future archaeologists to look at because landfill sites are designed to be fairly dry and with little microbial activity.  The biggest problem is not which polymer to use or how to process it but is how to get the end user to recognise the best way to dispose of the material and to then dispose of it in that way.  As I take an interest in materials, the problems of packaging and green technology I think of myself as reasonably good about taking packages apart and disposing of the bits in separate ways however even I get discouraged by having to search for the logo that tells me the polymer type and match this up with the list of which materials I can recycle and which I cannot and which have to be composted.  I am sure that in the future, as the technology improves, the labelling will be clearer and the collection will become comprehensive with the sorting done automatically. 

            In the mean time I keep looking at some of the developments and am curious how they will work out in the future.  I think that many people around the world have been shocked at the rise sharp rise in food prices caused in no small part by the switch by some farmers from growing food to growing crops for bio-fuel or bio-polymer feedstock.  The rise in oil prices suddenly created an imperative to find an alternative which caused big companies and governments to subsidise and offer high prices to encourage farmers to grow the necessary crops to evaluate these alternatives to oil.  This process was duplicated in many countries causing a large reduction in food production and hence the sharp rise in food prices. 

            Since then the price of oil has fallen back considerably there is a relaxing of the urgency in some quarters to finding a replacement to oil and so there may well be a reduction in the higher prices for the bio-fuel and bio-polymer feed stock and as the food prices have been raised there may well be some farmers who switch back to food production.  No doubt over the next few years this oscillation will reduce and stabilise but not without hardship for many of the worlds poor.  I now find myself with a dilemma of choosing between encouraging bio-raw materials and in so doing causing a food price rise or being a Luddite and continuing to squander the declining oil reserves.  

            The good news is that there are some intermediate actions that I know can help such as minimising the use of packaging as well as encouraging the better use of materials.  Many packaging materials are aimed at the lowest cost rather than the most ideal green solution.  Multilayer materials are often used to minimise the material thickness with suitable other properties but this may mean they cannot be re-cycled. Encouraging matched packaging materials, which can be re-cycled; even though they may not be the cheapest solution can be a better long term ecological solution.

            What looks to be part of the problem is that all the parts of the materials chain are separate.  The polymer manufacturers sell polymer film to converters who convert the films into the end packages for their customers who then sell the packaged products to shops who sell them on to customers who have to decide how to dispose of the packaging.  Were there to be a single manufacturer and converter for the whole process from start to finish so that the polymer manufacturer were also responsible for the final film disposal they might chose to make the disposal easier by making sure the package could be fully re-cycled.  However with so many different interested parties, all needing to remain profitable, it is easy to see how the end result can be different than if the whole process is viewed holistically.

               As we approach 2009 I look forward to yet another interesting year bringing forth yet another raft of ideas for new packaging solutions. Some of which will be good and some of which may look good initially but will be shown to be flawed and yet some others that will prove to be terrible.  The net result will be progress but always slower than expected.