Product Packaging: The Eco-Conscious Solution

Today's mass produced plastic packaging claims of biodegradability are not entirely accurate. The vast majority of plastics can only break down under the following specific conditions; continual exposure to sunlight and/or oxygen. In a landfill site, bulldozers regularly pile waste on top of other waste in order to create room for the millions of tons of future debris to arrive. Once these particular plastics are covered under soil/debris, the process of biodegradation stops completely.

Cordoba Wellness Coffee has found an alternative biofilm packaging product that will break down under any environmental landfill condition. This innovative product is being used in packaging our coffee blends as part of our overall corporate philosophy of reducing landfill waste.

Green Monster MasterBatch Pellets™

ECM BioFilms, Inc., has developed a new technology which can finally allow plastic product manufacturers a way to offer biodegradable products that can be priced competitively with, and have the same mechanical characteristics as, the traditional non-degradable plastics. The technology is an additive which, when combined as a one percent load to plastic resins, renders the finished plastic products biodegradable while maintaining their other desired characteristics. The company manufactures and sells its ECM MasterBatch Pellets (MBP) additive to polyolefin product manufacturers on a worldwide basis and is currently developing the technology for use with other resin groups, some of which should be ready for market soon.

The most obvious applications include one-use, disposable products such as waste disposal bags, all types of packaging products, disposable diapers, erosion control materials, plant containers, disposable medical apparatuses, agricultural films, food containers (i.e. McDonalds-type clam shell containers for sandwiches) and utensils, oil spill containment systems, and many others. Due to the exceptional shelf life and usable life of products manufactured with the additives, wherein biodegradation does not begin until disposal, items that are not of the "one use and then dispose of" type are beginning to be very important applications for the company’s technology as well. Items such as toys, games, tableware, notebooks, computer and cellular telephone casings, auto parts, etc., are all being developed and are considered to be extremely large potential markets.

The company has developed the technology to the point that nearly any plastic product producer can use the additive without having to modify their existing methods of production any more than if they were changing color. The resulting plastic products exhibit the same desired mechanical properties, have effectively the same shelf-lives, and yet, when disposed of, are able to be metabolized into ecologically beneficial biomass by the communities of microorganisms commonly found almost everywhere on this planet.

This biodegradation process can take place aerobically and an aerobically. It can take place with or without the presence of light. These factors allow for biodegradation even in landfill conditions that are normally not conducive to any plastic degradation and keep the plastic degradation from occurring when not desired.

The company's technology differs significantly from other "degradable plastics" emerging in the market today because it does not attempt to replace the currently popular plastic resin formulizations but instead enhances them by rendering them biodegradable. The company believes that it has the least expensive, most widely applicable, proven technology for making plastic products biodegradable available in the world today.