Convenience Shouldn’t Last Forever: Behind the Plastics vs. Aluminum Debate

Danielle Jezienicki — December 10, 2024

Sin­gle-use plas­tics have long been a sta­ple of the bev­er­age indus­try, offer­ing con­ve­nience despite well-doc­u­ment­ed neg­a­tive impacts on the envi­ron­ment.

As sup­port­ers often declare, plas­tic appears to be a log­i­cal pack­ag­ing solu­tion giv­en that it has a low­er car­bon foot­print com­pared to more durable alter­na­tives. What plas­tic pro­po­nents tend to glaze over is the fact that while plas­tic does have a low­er car­bon foot­print on a sin­gle-use basis, this met­ric fails to account for the neg­a­tive con­se­quences of this mate­r­i­al at its end-of-life. Put sim­ply, we have no solu­tions for plas­tic on a long-term basis. Since plas­tics can­not be infi­nite­ly recy­cled, its true end-of-life menu includes the fol­low­ing cours­es: 1) end­ing up in a land­fill 2) con­tribut­ing to pol­lu­tion or 3) con­tribut­ing to pol­lu­tion in the form of degrad­ing into microplas­tics. To add to the con­fu­sion, con­sumers are faced with an onslaught of prod­ucts made of recy­cled plas­tic. Unfor­tu­nate­ly, these recy­cled prod­ucts, whether yoga pants or rugs, are all tem­po­rary stor­age for plas­tic, and its end-of-life menu is unchanged.

Plas­tic can typ­i­cal­ly be recy­cled only 2–3 times before it inevitably ends up in a land­fill (at best) or con­tributes to envi­ron­men­tal pol­lu­tion, impact­ing ecosys­tems and human health alike. Plas­tic is not a mate­r­i­al that has a place in a cir­cu­lar econ­o­my. Its ben­e­fits are lim­it­ed to a sin­gle-use and lin­ear econ­o­my where the mod­el is: take, make, and waste. Recy­cling sug­gests oth­er­wise but should be under­stood for what it is – a longer route to becom­ing waste.

Com­pare this to a cir­cu­lar sys­tem that recap­tures and remakes mate­ri­als to avoid waste at end-of-life pro­vides a more accu­rate and apples-to-apples under­stand­ing of the true mate­r­i­al trade­offs. Car­bon foot­print is a met­ric designed to mea­sure the envi­ron­men­tal impact of a prod­uct on a sin­gle-use basis, which is the core issue. The chal­lenge at hand lies in tran­si­tion­ing com­pa­nies and con­sumers away from the sin­gle-use mod­el and toward a cir­cu­lar econ­o­my that pri­or­i­tizes sus­tain­abil­i­ty and resource effi­cien­cy, keep­ing mate­ri­als in per­pet­u­al cir­cu­la­tion.

Aluminum as a stepping stone towards circularity

Many com­pa­nies con­cerned with their envi­ron­men­tal impact and per­cep­tion are increas­ing­ly turn­ing to alu­minum as a sus­tain­able alter­na­tive. While alu­minum requires more ener­gy when ini­tial­ly pro­duced, its life­cy­cle or car­bon foot­print decreas­es sig­nif­i­cant­ly once recy­cled – and there­in lies the strength of this mate­r­i­al. Alu­minum can be recy­cled indef­i­nite­ly with­out los­ing its qual­i­ties, mak­ing it a strong can­di­date for a pack­ag­ing solu­tion in a cir­cu­lar econ­o­my. Its long-term ben­e­fits out­weigh the upfront ener­gy costs by sig­nif­i­cant­ly reduc­ing its net envi­ron­men­tal impact over time.

Prag­mat­i­cal­ly, there is much less con­sumer con­fu­sion about which bin to put an alu­minum can in, so obsta­cles to recy­cling are low­er than plas­tics. Far more U.S. con­sumers have access to alu­minum recy­cling than plas­tic recy­cling – lead­ing to a recy­cling rate for alu­minum cans that hov­ers around 50%, with efforts towards improve­ment already under­way.

Reach­ing a slight­ly high­er recy­cling rate is the miss­ing piece to real­iz­ing a tru­ly cir­cu­lar mate­r­i­al sys­tem in which the quan­ti­ty of recy­cled alu­minum is suf­fi­cient to meet demand, avoid­ing the need for new­ly extract­ed alu­minum. In the­o­ry, alu­minum could stay in per­pet­u­al cir­cu­la­tion and even­tu­al­ly not require any new mate­r­i­al inputs. Com­par­ing this con­cept with plas­tic show­cas­es the impos­si­bil­i­ty of a sim­i­lar out­come. Plas­tic can­not be con­tin­u­ous­ly recy­cled with­out degrad­ing, mak­ing clear how there is no use case for plas­tic that doesn’t result in con­tin­ued extrac­tion, pol­lu­tion and waste.

Enjoy short-term efficiencies vs. investing in longer-term solutions?

Com­pa­nies and con­sumers alike are grap­pling with this choice. Let’s explore how each mate­r­i­al stacks up.

Here’s the data on recy­cling plas­tics:

• Less than 5% of plas­tics are recy­cled. (PET rates are high­er, but still lim­it­ed as a recy­clable mate­r­i­al for most U.S. con­sumers).
• Plas­tic can only be recy­cled 2–3 times before degrad­ing.
• 12 mil­lion tons of plas­tic enters the ocean every year.
• Plas­tic is derived from fos­sil fuels, con­tribut­ing to cli­mate change and pro­vid­ing a glide path for fos­sil fuel com­pa­nies to keep pol­lut­ing as the world decar­bonizes. At our cur­rent rate of pro­duc­tion, plas­tic pro­duc­tion will dou­ble by 2030, and exceed emis­sions gen­er­at­ed by the coal indus­try.
• The health impacts of emis­sions released by the plas­tics indus­try are dis­pro­por­tion­ate­ly felt by low-income com­mu­ni­ties and peo­ple of col­or.

Alter­na­tive­ly, here’s how alu­minum com­pares when con­sid­er­ing a longer time hori­zon:

• Alu­minum can be infi­nite­ly recy­cled.
• The most recent EPA data avail­able shows that over 50% of alu­minum cans were recy­cled in the U.S. in 2018, a num­ber poised to grow with access to bet­ter recy­cling infra­struc­ture.
• It takes 95% less ener­gy to make recy­cled alu­minum prod­ucts as com­pared to new prod­ucts.
• 75% of alu­minum ever pro­duced is still in use today.

House View: Embracing circularity for sustainable growth (when you can)

Alu­minum is not a per­fect mate­r­i­al, but when con­sid­ered as part of a sys­temic solu­tion, it can offer a vast improve­ment over plas­tic for the bev­er­age indus­try. With its abil­i­ty to be end­less­ly recy­cled and grow­ing con­sumer famil­iar­i­ty with prop­er recy­cling prac­tices, alu­minum requires less effort to dri­ve behav­ioral change–an ongo­ing chal­lenge for plas­tic. More­over, as recy­cling infra­struc­ture con­tin­ues to advance, alu­minum’s poten­tial to sup­port a cir­cu­lar econ­o­my becomes even more com­pelling.

Ulti­mate­ly, our view is that plas­tic recy­cling, while well-inten­tioned, fol­lows a lin­ear path that always results in waste —from fos­sil fuel extrac­tion to land­fills or envi­ron­men­tal pol­lu­tion. It’s a short-term fix with a cen­turies-long impact, as most plas­tics take over 500 years to break down into even more harm­ful microplas­tics.

This won’t be an option for all indus­tries. Pack­ag­ing changes are par­tic­u­lar­ly chal­leng­ing in the food space giv­en the need for light­weight pack­ag­ing that ensures shelf life and fresh­ness, mak­ing tran­si­tion­ing out of plas­tic a longer-term jour­ney. Com­pa­nies have a wide range of options to reduce their plas­tic foot­print, include tran­si­tion­ing to more recy­clable plas­tics, adopt­ing refill sys­tems that allow for pack­ag­ing reuse, offer­ing bulk sizes, uti­liz­ing more recy­clable mono­ma­te­ri­als imple­ment­ing pack­ag­ing take-back pro­grams, and estab­lish­ing strate­gic part­ner­ships.

Beyond Recycling: The strategic opportunity for innovators

While both alu­minum and plas­tic offer unique advan­tages and dis­ad­van­tages, nei­ther mate­r­i­al pro­vides a com­plete solu­tion to the envi­ron­men­tal chal­lenges of sin­gle-use pack­ag­ing. The real­i­ty is that as an indus­try, we can and need to do bet­ter to move towards a cir­cu­lar econ­o­my, which requires a tran­si­tion away from sin­gle use habits. Aluminum’s recy­cla­bil­i­ty and dura­bil­i­ty mak­ing it an appeal­ing option for com­pa­nies look­ing to enhance sus­tain­abil­i­ty. How­ev­er, its high ini­tial ener­gy cost and extrac­tion process remains a sig­nif­i­cant envi­ron­men­tal hur­dle. On the oth­er hand, plas­tic, despite a low­er upfront car­bon foot­print, con­tributes to wide­spread envi­ron­men­tal pol­lu­tion, sup­ports fos­sil fuel extrac­tion, has lim­it­ed recy­cla­bil­i­ty, and faces increas­ing­ly neg­a­tive con­sumer per­cep­tion.

While alu­minum pro­vides a vision aligned with a less waste­ful future, there is no avoid­ing the real­i­ty that sin­gle use isn’t the solu­tion we should aspire to. It’s excit­ing to con­sid­er a world where an on-the-go snack has a wrap­per that biode­grades to restore soil health, clean­ing prod­ucts are con­cen­trat­ed tablets and per­son­al care items are refill­able with­out com­pro­mise on effi­ca­cy or brand selec­tion. In many cas­es, these prod­ucts already exist yet remain min­i­mal­ly adopt­ed. The sin­gle largest obsta­cle to mov­ing towards this real­i­ty is the wide­spread use, avail­abil­i­ty and accep­tance of plas­tic pack­ag­ing.

The future of sus­tain­able pack­ag­ing depends on inno­v­a­tive solu­tions that effec­tive­ly bal­ance these trade-offs along­side their costs, dri­ving a shift away from the sin­gle-use plas­tic busi­ness mod­el. Com­pa­nies that com­mit to find­ing bet­ter answers through mate­r­i­al advance­ments, closed-loop mod­els, or explore entire­ly new approach­es may be posi­tioned to lead the mar­ket and dri­ve mean­ing­ful change. Cen­tral to this out­come is reject­ing the notion that plas­tic is an accept­able long-term solu­tion. It is time to embrace sys­tems-lev­el change to cre­ate a future where prof­it is decou­pled from plas­tic pol­lu­tion.

About the Author: Since July 2023, Danielle has been the Impact Advi­sor for Ground­Force Cap­i­tal where she works with the fund’s port­fo­lio com­pa­nies to imple­ment and achieve best prac­tices in ESG and impact. Danielle liais­es among Ground­Force Capital’s Invest­ment Team and its Invest­ment Com­mit­tee to edu­cate each on the issues and how to con­sid­er reme­di­a­tion. In addi­tion, Danielle assists Ground­Force Capital’s port­fo­lio com­pa­nies with reme­di­at­ing any ESG issues and help­ing them expand on cur­rent ESG poli­cies and impact met­rics.

Danielle recent­ly found­ed her con­sult­ing prac­tice, Impact FWD, where she sup­ports investors and brands as a frac­tion­al head of impact and sus­tain­abil­i­ty. In this role, she helps define and oper­a­tional­ize sus­tain­abil­i­ty strate­gies across invest­ments, port­fo­lio com­pa­nies, and brands. Cur­rent clients include Nespres­so, Cab­i­net Health and Lulu and Geor­gia as well as advi­so­ry rela­tion­ships with EQT Part­ners and rePur­pose Glob­al. Danielle has exper­tise in impact invest­ment dili­gence as well as oper­at­ing exper­tise across con­sumer prod­ucts, pack­ag­ing, waste/materials, cir­cu­lar­i­ty and sup­ply chain.

Sources:

1. Guardian, Ellen McArthur Foun­da­tion
2. BBC Sci­ence
3. EPA
4. Green­peace
5. Break Free From Plas­tics
6. Alu­minum Asso­ci­a­tion