The Philadelphia Inquirer had an interesting story this weekend about the Electrolux Design Lab competition. A number of interesting devices are mentioned in the article, but I'm most fascinated with the "Return Pot," which uses a magnetic field to turn polylactic acid (PLA) resin into compost for plants. Here's how it works:
"As the user spins the battery-less Return Pot, a ball bearing moves through a coil tunnel, creating a magnetic field that generates electricity to power the return cycle. The result is water, compost and a small amount of carbon dioxide, according to the inventor."This is basically a home device that turns plastic into plant food. Wow. From a sustainability point of view, that's virtually a miracle. However, there is one major catch. The Return Pot decomposes PLA plastic, not petroleum-based resins, and there just isn't much PLA being used as of yet. D'oh!
If you haven't heard of PLA, it's a relatively new corn-based plastic that is very slowly being adopted in some packaging, such as water bottles and cups. On the downside, it takes corn to create the product, which could be used for food. Also, because the product decomposes, it can't be used in packaging that has to last a long time or stand up to very warm conditions. However, given the right conditions (heat, humidity and micro-organisms), PLA will fully decompose into nutrients for the soil.
I'm going to be writing more about PLA in the future, but in the meantime, do check out the Inquirer article to see the sustainable marvels that some very bright minds have created.
Designed for Coexisting (Philadelphia Inquirer)
Electrolux Design Lab 2007
3 comments:
There are a lot of problems with PLA - If we made all of the plastic disposable items used in the world every year, it would take one hundred million tons of corn to make it. That would lead to mass starvation in the third world, as that represents at least 10% of the world's grain supply. Also, in landfills, PLA exudes methane when it decomposes-and methane is a potent greenhouse gas. It also takes a huge amount of diesel to grow, fertilize, ship, and process this corn. The alternative? Oxo-biodegradable plastics. See http://biogreenproducts.biz for full information.
I commend innovation and the introduction of plastics that will help with the plastic problem. Plastic bottles are a growing problem in our landfills and oceans. We felt that something needed to be done……and now.
We felt that plastics made from crops that could be producing food, wasn’t the answer. In fact we were wondering what would become of all the PLA plastics produced. The wouldn't biodegrade in a landfill, and they are not accepted by recyclers as PLA ruins the recycle stream of PET plastics.
Additionally, many reports indicate that in addition to causing our food process to rise, the equipment and chemicals used to produce food based bio-fuel may be increasing pollution.
We knew that there wasn’t going to be one “fix it all” answer and began to wonder if anything was ever going to be done. The problem was growing every day, more bottles were being manufactured and more bottles were accumulating in places where we didn’t need them.
We were wondering if “Earth Friendly Bottles” would ever be available?
That’s why we decided to do our part and started ENSO Bottles. We are partnering with other companies to offer a PET plastic bottle that will biodegrade, compost or recycle.
Our bottles can be produced in a clear or colored version, however, clear version isn't quite as clear as current PET plastic bottles but then again that's one way to identify our earth friendly bottle.
ENSO is trying to achieve sustainability with our plastic bottles. Our goal is to make bottles that won’t have the adverse impact on our environment and are made from non food bio-fuels.
We haven't started making them from bio-fuel but that’s high on our agenda and hopefully will be something we can offer in the future.
But for now, we offer a plastic bottle that is earth friendly...it’s just one step but if we all take just one step toward improving our planet….we will make a difference.
I think that was a great post. PLA plastic is a good step forward and being able to compost it takes one of the complaints cmpetitive producers make, out of the picture. For example the previous two postings show up wherever PLA showes up.. I guess that is business.
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