Bioplastics Live May 2023: Bioplastics offer climate benefits, but need investment and research

Bioplastics can help companies reduce their carbon footprint but they need more work to become competitive with fossil fuel-based polymers.

Those were some of the conclusions of speakers on the May 17 Bioplastics Live, presented by Plastics News and Sustainable Plastics.

“Bio-based polymers could assist in replacing fossil ones. Still, research must be further encouraged to fully understand the environmental footprint of these decisions and technology, and true cost must become competitive,” said Rafael Auras, a professor at Michigan State University’s School of Packaging.

Bio-based plastics have been in the news since March 22, when the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy outlined bold goals for helping the U.S. become a leader in biotechnology and biomanufacturing.

The full recording for our Bioplastics Live program from May 17 is above. Rafael Auras presentation (02:25), Q&A discussion with Auras (45:30), Kelvin Okamoto's presentation (51:06) and Q&A discussion with Conor Carlin, Steve Toloken and Karen Laird (1:09:28).

The announcement was much broader than plastics, but the plastics goal has generated intense interest in the U.S. plastics supply chain. President Joe Biden’s administration  said it wants to develop technology that could replace 90 percent of fossil fuel-based plastics with bio-based alternatives over the next two decades.

The ambitious goal is aimed at addressing climate, food and health challenges.

“Practically, from a business perspective, the first question is, who’s going to pay for this?” said Conor Carlin, president-elect of the Society of Plastics Engineers and co-author of the book Plastics & Sustainability. “You know, 1 or 2 percent of global polymer production is from biobased sources. … It’s significantly more expensive.

“Everybody along the supply chain” will be impacted by that, Carlin said. 

He added, though, that he supports the bioplastics initiative, even if they don’t look realistic at this point. Carlin called the White House proposals “big, hairy audacious goals.”

“I think fundamentally, you have to set big goals though, right? I mean, if we agree that the scale of the challenges is big, and generational, then if we’re not going to set big goals, we’re not going to give people something to work for over the next longer-term period. If it attracts more people into these industries, to work harder and find the breakthroughs.” Carlin said.

Kelvin Okamoto of Green Bottom Line Inc. put the necessary investment into perspective.

“The goals are important. But the other part is to think about it, it takes an average of anywhere from three to five years to build a 200-million-pound-a-year plant. We’re going to need tens, if not a few hundred of those, to really get to that goal. So work has to start now on a lot of those facilities to get to that 90 percent in 20 years, or even get to the 25 percent in 20 years,” Okamoto said.

All the speakers also covered end-of-life issues for bio-based polymers. They noted that, despite public perception, bioplastics are recyclable, not all are biodegradable or compostable.

Some bioplastics are chemically identical to existing polymers, but others are not. For those that are compostable, there are still hurdles in taking advantage of those properties at a big scale.

“The benefit of biodegradable and compostable polymers of offering an additional disposable route is only realized if the material is disposed of in an appropriate waste management system that uses the material’s biodegradable features,” Auras said.

“Otherwise, compostable polymers would accumulate like other plastic materials in landfills and the environment,” he said.

Okamoto added: "We all need to be much more informed about what bio-based means, what bioplastics are, what the plastics world is like, and making sure that the proper information gets out to everyone so that we are properly informed and then also get the proper legislation and regulations in place going forward."