Oranges Are Good For You (And The Earth)

Permalink 01/20/05  

Two of the top stories of the last year have been that world oil production is peaking, and that climate change is real, and human-caused. And interestingly, this week, Cornel University researchers announced a new type of plastic which is a first step toward addressing both problems. Thank your lucky stars for oranges.
Orange

Cornel Scientists announced this week that they had developed a novel polymer composed of an oily component of orange peels, and carbon dioxide. Since CO2 is a greenhouse gas currently being held responsible for a large amount of climate change, sequestering it in non-atmospheric form is a pressing concern. Hundreds of different ideas, from pumping liquid CO2 to the bottom of the ocean, to injecting it into abandoned wells have been proposed, but most are too expensive, or ineffective.

However, if this process could store a viable amount of CO2, the process could actually be made to make money, since at the end, you would have saleable plastic. Furthermore, since this plastic requires no petroleum products (Other than to power the equipment to make it, but this could utilize a non-petroleum power source), it would ease our need for oil.

This is just the latest and most thorough success in a growing movement to utilize industrial waste streams as resources. Products like Ultratouch insulation, which uses offcuts of cotton cloth for fiber, or Smile Plastics, which re-forms reject plastic parts into unique raw plastic sheeting, are also helping to turn the tide of material use and waste production. Or, on the pure product end, MIO culture lab converts the waste stream or derelict manufacturer directly into new products.

So what about your product? Is there some wastestream just waiting for you to claim it?
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