Coco-Cola's "Bottle of the Future"

The Coco-Cola Company recently released its "PlantBottle." This is a 100% recyclable PET plastic bottle produced from plant-waste material. Coco-Cola plans to launch this new bottle globally at the 2010 Vancouver Olympics. Coco-Cola released a statement that it plans to eventually produce all its PET plastic from plant-waste material, including woodchips.


Coco-Cola promotes the "plant-bottle' as a practical innovation because it can be recycled as a normal plastic bottle. Heres a quote from an article explaining the apparent usefulness of producing normal plastic form plant-waste:

"These bottles are PET. That means to a recycling facility, it is no different then your standard plastic bottle. In their eyes, making a bottle biodegradable, the embodied energy, that is, the usefulness of that bottle is lost when it disintegrates. With a PlantBottle, it can once again be made into another product."

Coco-Cola promotes 'Recycle' over 'Reuse' because recycling practices don't question Coco-Cola's massive production of plastic for one-time consumption. "PlantBottle" tries to legitimate plastic-consumption for the consumer because the product is 1) recyclable and 2) is produced from a 'waste' and therefore must be sustainable. However, recycling is sooo energy intensive, that promoting it over 'Reuse' practices actually does our environment a disservice.


here's a few links to some articles on the PlantBottle. Enjoy.

http://earthandindustry.com/2009/11/coca-cola-unveils-plant-based-bottle-of-the-future/

http://www.triplepundit.com/2009/06/cokes-new-plantbottle-fluff-or-real-progress/