by Justin Cocchiola

Abstract

The need to “go green” has become a very important and highly debated issue in society within the last couple of years. Many large companies are feeling the pressure from government agencies to incorporate more energy efficient policies and products into their businesses, and countless dollars of research are being funded for greener technologies that look to help clean up the environment. Polylactic Acid (PLA) corn plastic is one of those up and coming technologies, and many companies are beginning to take notice of the product. Corn plastic is a biodegradable plastic that can be composted back into the earth, or it can be recycled for re-use. Corn plastic’s main competitor is traditional plastic, which takes thousands of years to decompose and continues to dominate landfills across the world. This article takes a look at the many benefits of corn plastic, and how the plastic is recycled, and the concerns companies have with corn plastic. Corn plastic is a relatively new technology that is produced from renewable crops. Company’s interest in corn plastic is growing at an accelerated rate, and the product is set to take the place of traditional plastic in the future.

Introduction

For years people have been recycling, and for years people have been recycling incorrectly. Recycling is typically thrust upon children in their elementary school classes at a young age, so they can go home and participate with their families and learn how to recycle. However, the problem is how do you recycle? Millions of plastic water bottles each day are being recycled improperly. In order to recycle a plastic water bottle properly you must remove the lid of the water bottle. A simple task, but one that isn’t always completed because it’s an unknown fact that the lid of a water bottle is made of a different type of plastic, and people’s good intentions go unnoticed. As plastic continues to fill up landfills and use up our limited natural resources, scientists are looking at different ways to produce plastics. Corn plastic became a realistic possibility in the early 1980’s, but the products were expensive to make and far inferior to that of traditional plastic. However, as time went on scientists found ways to reduce the cost of producing corn plastic, and now Polylactic Acid (PLA) corn plastic is being used in stores all across America. There are many advantages to using corn plastic that heavily out-weigh itsdisadvantages. For example, switching the means of plastic production would provide a big investment for companies. Therefore, this chapter looks into why manufacturers should switch from traditional plastic to corn plastic.

Benefits of Corn Plastic

If asked to invest more money in a product that is bio-degradable, saves natural resources, reduces our dependency on foreign oil, and causes less pollution, what’s the answer many would expect? I hope it would be yes. People get into trouble by their lack of prowess, or an unwillingness to take a chance on something new. The benefits of corn plastic are endless. A company that is already making the transition from traditional Polyethylene Terephthalate (PET) plastic to corn plastic is Wal-mart, which the corporation uses in food packaging Many of the containers that are on their shelves are made of corn plastic. Everything from the plastic in which Wal-mart wraps deli meats ; to the packaging of the high-end electronics they advertise, is made from corn plastic. The switch has caused Wal-mart alone to save over 800,000 barrels of oil annually. Many customers have heard about Wal-mart’s efforts to “go green” and have begun shopping there on a more regularly—leading to an increase in sales for the company.

Biodegradable Plastic

One of the most beneficial aspects of corn plastic is its biodegradability. The plastic decomposes into carbon dioxide and water in 90 days. However, it’s not as easy as it sounds. The plastic will biodegrade, but it must be done in a controlled composting environment. This means there needs to be factories set up for corn plastic to be recycled to its maximum capability. Ideally the controlled composting process consists of an environment where plants scraps are digested into the earth at about 140-degrees Fahrenheit. Obviously this isn’t something that people are going to be able to do on their own domestically, but all they would have to do is place corn plastic products in a bin and take the plastic to the necessary location. There are 113 facilities in the United States that recycle corn plastic. Of these 113, about one-quarter collect food scraps from cities. Colleges and prisons that collect their own recyclables run some facilities.
Some people are arguing that recycling corn plastic is too complicated and people won’t be willing to put forth the effort. However, we have millions of people each day recycling plastic that will end up in landfills for the next few thousand years because they didn’t remove the lid from off of their plastic water bottle. To give you an idea of how much trash is actually plastic, which was either recycled improperly or just thrown away, 12.1% of all generated waste is traditional PET, or High-Density Polyethylene (HDPE) polycarbonate plastic water bottles. When you stop to think about that for a second you should see where the problem lies. We’re quickly running out of space in our landfills, and if just over 12% of our trash right now is plastic that isn’t biodegradable, where are we going to put all of the trash that people produce in the future. Another way to look at this problem is the amount of natural resources being used to create a one-time use products Even if corn plastic isn’t properly recycled, the plastic took 65% less energy to be produced, released 68% fewer green house gases, and used absolutely no petroleum.

Environmental Concerns

One of the growing concerns of the biodegradability of corn plastic is whether or not it is harmful to the environment. NatureWorks insists that since there is such a little amount of corn plastic being produced that it is in no way harming the environment when it’s recycled. The main concern is that when corn plastic is recycled the plastic reverts into lactic acid, which could potentially make the compost more acidic. This process could only potentially result if high amounts of corn plastic were being recycled in one place, causing the compost to be over exposed to the amount of carbon dioxide and water being released from the product. NatureWorks, which is the leading producer of corn plastic, introduced the product to retailers in 2003. The company is aware of the growing concerns of the recyclables of corn plastic, however, NatureWorks has stood behind theproduct, and continueto work with companies on producing new corn plastic products. For example NatureWorks and Primo, a distributor of bottled water, have struck a deal to sell the bottled water in a corn plastic container. However, NatureWorks is aware of the growing concerns that the government and scientists have with this newly discovered product, so they are taking it slowly in terms of producing and proliferating corn plastic products throughout the market. Taking it slowly is basically NatureWorks’s way of showing the recycling industry that corn plastic is a safe alternative to traditional plastic.
Scientists are also concerned that recycling corn plastic water bottles with traditional plastic will contaminate the recycling process, in much the same way that comingling traditional materials requires extra resources prevent spoilage by the ton. But corn plastic is versatile, a product that can be recycled in more ways than one. Corn plastic can be recycled in such a way that it’s used for compost, or it can be recycled like traditional plastic, the materials recovered for re-use. NatureWorks conducted a study in 2006 for the German government thatfound that recycling corn plastic in the traditional manner was the most environmentally friendly way to recycle the product. Corn plastic was found to be more beneficial in every way, minus water pollution, over traditional plastic if the corn plastic wasn’t recycled at all. Another way to look at corn plastic from a recycling standpoint would be how it’s produced. Corn plastic is made mostly corn unsuitable for food consumption; and switchgrass, which is a low-water plant. These crops can be re-grown over and over again, compared to using billions of barrels of oil each year in producing plastic. Corn plastic products are already being used in many cafeteria and sport’s parks around America. All of the plastics that are contaminated by food are made from corn plastic, thrown into trash bags made of corn plastic, and in turn are shipped off to the appropriate recycling plant to be composted back into the environment.

Recycling Struggles

The main problem with recycling corn plastic comes in the household. In order to recycle corn plastic on a home-by-home basis the corn plastic must be divided from the traditional plastic into separate bins. Thus it is left up to the consumer to know whether the plastic s/he is recycling is a corn plastic or a traditional plastic. Educated recyclers are proficient at categorizing and sorting many materials, but as of now they still don’t know where to take the corn plastic they are trying to recycle. This poses problems that NatureWorks is working to resolve. Corn plastic also has a much lower melting point than traditional plastic, which is another growing concern for mixing the two plastics in the recycling process. NatureWorks says no problems will result, and thus far no problems have occurred in any form of the recycling process of corn plastic. Since the product is newer, people are skepticalmainly because there’s a lack of information on how itis used. States such as Oregon, New York and Connecticut have bottle bills in their respective states, so they consider the mix of corn plastic and traditional plastic to be contamination. The reason is simple: all recycled plastic that is bundled and tested for purity. Mixed plastics lower the purity of the whole, and it takes extraordinarily low incidence of mixing (one bottle in a sample of 1,000) to contaminate a bundle. This results in the state receiving less money for the plastics their residents have recycled. Typically states that force people to recycle, by law or incentive, recycle 74% more than the states that don’t put as much emphasis on recycling.

Concluding the Corn Plastic Argument

Corn plastic is the plastic of the future. If corn plastic isn’t the dominant plastic within the next 50 years, a hybrid or byproduct of Polylactic Acid (PLA) corn plastic that is considered to be a “green” product, and biodegradable, will be on shelves everywhere. Basically the only problem so far with corn plastic, as far as a production standpoint is concerned,is the age of the product. Corn plastic dates back to the 1980’s, and then Patrick Gruber, a Cargill chemist, created the first corn plastic product on his stove in 1989. However, the polylactic polymer that we have today was introduced to the world in 2003. That makes the product about six years old, which means people are going to be skeptical about using such a new product that varies a great deal from its competitor. The benefits of corn plastic are great. Corn plastic is produced using non-edible corn and switchgrass, while using no petroleum in the product whatsoever. The product is more energy efficient to produce, using 65% less energy during the production process; and pollutes the environment with 68% less greenhouse gases. Public opinion tends to make political battles out of environmental issues. This ought not to be the case at all. In this situation you have to look at the present facts : the world is running out of natural resources, most vital petroleum. When crude oil skyrockets at different points throughout the upcoming years, many companies will entertain the possibility of corn plastic . Corn plastic is much more energy efficient, and costs about the same to produce when crude oil is expensive. What needs to happen is schools, companies, and the government need to start educating people on how to recycle, not only corn plastic, but traditional plastic. Different companies plan to slowly introduce corn plastics to diverse communities in the upcoming future. If corn plastics prove clean, harmless, and in a word, an effective form for recycling, then companies will begin to adopt the technology more often. For the time being, as corn plastic looms on the horizon, society must do a better job of educating the general public on necessary recycling techniques. In our everyday lives there should be a premium on preserving material resources for posterity.