Don’t Climb On That Bus Just Yet
The use of degradable additives in PET packaging has seemed to some to be a dream come true. No longer would we have to worry about filling up the landfills with an item that would be there for very, very long time. Those that end up in a landfill would just decompose. Wonderful, right? Not so fast.
The National Association for PET Container Resources has recently called for restraint in moving forward with the introduction of degradeables due to insufficient data to support the claims of positive environmental impact. This article states the reasons for their call of warning. One that caught me was that degrading plastics don’t have any soil benefits. So, if it doesn’t benefit the soil, what happens? Is what’s left over completely inert, incapabale of causing any damage? Could be but until we kow better for sure, I agree that companies should approach this more slowly.