Earthbound Farm, Naked Juice to use 100% recycled plastic

Check out this story in USA Today about the announcement that Earthbound Farm will be using 100% post-consumer recycled PET in some of their clamshell packaging. Earthbound claims the program will:

• Save 424,224 million BTUs (MMBTUs) of energy
• Avoid 16,191 tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions
• Save 68,307 gallons of water
• Keep 1,308,623 pounds of solid waste out of the landfill

Also, Pepsi's Nature Juice division will begin offering what it is calling the reNEWbottle. This is the first nationally distributed 100% post-consumer PET bottle available to the public. Nature Juice make claims that virgin plastic consumption will be reduced by 8.1 million pounds per year, saving 57,000 barrels of oil every year – the equivalent of taking 3,460 cars off of the road.

Any use of recycled content is good. It drives markets which makes recycling more cost efficient. But recyclability is also an issue. Almost all recycling programs accept just plastics 1 and 2 (PET and HDPE) with necks. So while Nature Juice will be able to be recycled again, Earthbound Farms containers are generally not.

Luckily at T2T, we have a partnership with Plastic Pallet Solutions which accepts all plastics EXCEPT for styrofoam and film (bags). They make pallets, crates and other items with the materials.