by Michael Smith (Veshengro)
Aside from PepsiCo's claim of “heritage as an innovator and leader in environmental sustainability” that made me almost laugh out loud – a bit like McDonald's claiming to be fighting childhood obesity – the statement of this plant-based plastic from a variety of plant starches making a PET bottle is a little bit misleading.
PET (polyethylene terephthalate) is a petro-chemical product and based on oil which the bio-plast bottle is not oil-based. It is a replacement for the PET bottle but it not, to all intents and purposes, PET in itself, it just has the same structure.
Also, I am not entirely convinced as to the “first” bio-plast PET replacement bottle as there are bottles for bottled water about already that claim to be entirely compostable and to be made from plant starches.
The claims aside, however, this must be seen as a good move as far as beverages other than water are concerned. There is no need for bottled water in most developed countries, especially not is we use a filtration system, should it be necessary.
PepsiCo's "green" bottle is 100% recyclable and far surpasses existing industry technologies, says Pepsi. But, hello people, ordinary PET is also 100% recyclable, into garments and such like. Compostable is what we need and want.
The bottle, says PepsiCo, is made from bio-based raw materials, including switch grass, pine bark and corn husks and in the future, the company expects to broaden the renewable sources used to create the "green" bottle to include orange peels, potato peels, oat hulls and other agricultural byproducts from its foods business.
This process, they say, further reinforces PepsiCo's "Power of One" advantage by driving a strategic beverage innovation via a food-based solution. Now why do have this horrible urge to laugh out loud once again?
PepsiCo states that combining biological and chemical processes it has identified methods to create a molecular structure that is identical to petroleum-based PET (polyethylene terephthalate), which results in a bottle that looks, feels and protects its product identically to existing PET beverage containers. The company will pilot production of the new bottle in 2012. and upon successful completion of the pilot, the company intends to move directly to full-scale commercialization.
With this development, PepsiCo says, it continues its leadership position in environmental sustainability and driving progress against the global goals and commitments it announced in 2010 to protect the Earth's natural resources through innovation and more efficient use of land, energy, water and packaging. Specific examples of PepsiCo's recent environmental innovations and progress include:
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SunChips developing the world’s first fully compostable bag and using solar power at the Modesto manufacturing facility to take some of the plant off the electrical grid;
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light-weighting Aquafina’s bottles with the introduction of the Eco-Fina bottle in 2009, the lightest bottle of its size among U.S. bottled water brands;
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Naked Juice transitioning to a 100 percent post-consumer recycled plastic bottle with the introduction of its reNEWabottle™ - the first beverage, distributed nationally in the U.S., to do so;
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achieving "positive water balance" in India in 2009 – through direct seeding initiatives, the company replenished nearly six billion liters of water across India, exceeding the total intake of approximately five billion liters of water by its manufacturing facilities;
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introducing the Dream Machine recycling initiative, to provide greater access to on-the-go recycling receptacles and help increase the U.S. beverage container recycling rate from 34 percent to 50 percent, by 2018;
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launching a groundbreaking pilot program, using low-carbon fertilizers that drastically reduce Tropicana’s lifecycle carbon footprint; and
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Walkers becoming the first company in the world to display a carbon reduction logo on a consumer product, representing a commitment to become more sustainable and transparent.
Personally, my issue is with some of the products, including the Auqafina, and even though PepsiCo is open enough to indicate that it is “municipal water”, it is water in a bottle and there is no need for this in most of the countries where such water is top seller, such as the USA and the United Kingdom. Then again, if we, the consumers, would not buy such products and be happy enough, and cleaver enough, to make do with tap water – filtered if need be – in our own reusable bottles, manufacturers would not produce the stuff. It is up to us, each and every one of us.
On the other hand a bottle – plastic bottle – based on natural materials, much of which would be a waste product, is a great way to go and maybe this innovation by PepsiCo could lead the way to the manufacture of other bio-plastics that could replace the petroleum-based ones and thus make many of our products that we use on a daily basis (more) sustainable.
© 2011
