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Food Packaging

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Re: Food Packaging

#121

Post by ASalazarMX »

nightski wrote: post #104
panta wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Transportation costs and breakage are perhaps higher, but maybe that’s a cost we should accept? I suspect that transportation and breakage costs are higher only because we don't account for externalities when considering plastic: in other words producers don't sustain the full costs and are effectively subsidized by the society at large and the environment (through increased healthcare spending, lower QOL, higher o…

Glass has externalities as well. If all transportation weight is significantly higher that is going to have a large impact on global warming until we switch to clean transportation which to be frank is a long ways off if we are being honest.

Meat, plastics, metals, gas, everything that generates greenhouse gases in significant amounts has to become costlier so people consume it less.

It's been proven time after time that we won't reduce emissions by appealing to the social conscience of people and corporations, but everybody obeys economic measures.

Re: Food Packaging

#122

Post by ASalazarMX »

sizzle wrote: post #94
tremon wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

and one of those Dutch condiment spatulas For reference, I assume you mean a bottle scraper here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bottle_scraper They're not specifically intended for condiments (most jam jars are low and wide enough that they can be scraped with a spoon), but for storing more viscous liquids in larger glass (milk) bottles, like yoghurt or vla.

Wow where has this been all my life?!? So much wasted product thrown away in bottles

So many nearly empty Nutella jars have died for nothing.

Re: Food Packaging

#123

Post by ASalazarMX »

thomasguide wrote: post #99
LargoLasskhyfv wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You know? Maybe a few dozen standard sized and broad/wide necked tops made out of laboratory grade glass would do. That stuff is almost indestructible and does not leach or take on anything in the concentrations used for food/drink stuff. Not even tea or coffee stains! So there is the question of the returns. Why returning when you could have a refill machine in store which could clean them fast in safe ways before r…

Plastic American-style milk bottles are funnily enough one of the only easily recycled plastics, if I am remembering correctly. Standardized glass containers would be useful, although in some ways already exist (mason jars usually accept common lids, for instance). What we need is a shift in mentality away from a plastic-first approach. “I’ve got one word for you kid: glass.”

> Plastic American-style milk bottles are funnily enough one of the only easily recycled plastics, if I am remembering correctly.

I don't know about the recyclability of those plastics, but I wouldn't be surprised. They're basically two pieces of plastic screwed together without any seal, and it works well enough!

Re: Food Packaging

#124

Post by ASalazarMX »

hallway_monitor wrote: post #41
colordrops wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be blunt your argument for polluting our environment doesn't feel like it's in good faith when you blame wood for being a pollutant until a fungus showed up hundreds of millions of years ago. I absolutely loathe the term "whataboutism" but this seems like a real example - "what about the fact that wood was a pollutant hundreds of millions of years ago? We should be able to dump plastic now".

It would be somewhat ironic if a bacteria were to evolve to eat plastic and be invasive. An organism like that would have quite an effect on humanity's habits.

Corporations: Behold our new duraplastic with embedded antibiotics! Don't thank us, just give us money!

Re: Food Packaging

#125

Post by ggm »

_Microft wrote: post #120
ggm wrote: post #5

There's a book from 25+ years ago on the design of cardboard boxes which goes to similar levels of obsessive detail. Part Art college, design school, industrial design and part coffee table book. Cardboard, it's origami for industry: sheet form, now optimise assembly, cost and structural integrity alongside ease of production...

Here are some names of package design books that I came across recently: "The Package Design Book", "Structural Package Design" and "Complex Packaging" via https://mobile.twitter.com/robin7331/status/1484442902050881...

If any of them date from the 1970s, they're good candidates. Didn't recognize the covers but there's often more than one edition of a book. Nice find! they look to be in the same class, possibly even better!

Re: Food Packaging

#126

Post by eppsilon »

AnIdiotOnTheNet wrote: post #103
aldebran wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some people do. 1. Reduce plastic consumption as much as you can. 2. Use reusable bags 3. Choose packaging that contains less plastic. This is truly horrible in the US. Apple sauce containers for kids have so much unnecessary plastic. I mean the ones with the fancy caps that are big only to appeal to kids. And to reduce your carbon footprint further - controversial point incoming - reduce or stop eating meat. “But, a…

To that end, does anyone know a good way to deal with dog waste that doesn't involve plastic? I feel like sealing dog waste away in this nigh-indestructible container is a really stupid idea, but I haven't yet thought of a better way of picking the stuff up.

There are biodegradable bags [1], but not sure if they are completely plastic-free ("38% vegetable-based").

1. http://amzn.com/dp/B01LXVVH1I

Re: Food Packaging

#127

Post by Semaphor »

Broken_Hippo wrote: post #96
Semaphor wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You also earn closer to US salaries. A friend of mine moved to Switzerland, and he jokes that Swiss cleaners at the border hire German cleaners for their places ;)

"You also earn closer to US salaries." You say this like it is a good thing. Do folks at the bottom third have to endure the same sort of poverty, earning wages their parents earned yet paying more for everything? Oh, I'm guessing you just mean folks that are in certain fields, and that really isn't representative of US wages. Normal folks are pretty poor.

> You say this like it is a good thing.

No, I did not. It was pretty value neutral.

> Oh, I'm guessing you just mean folks that are in certain fields

I guess it was a bit roundabout. The USA being the USA, people are often severely underpaid, which does not seem to be the case in Switzerland. But considering where we are, I mean tech salaries, which are pretty high.

Re: Food Packaging

#128

Post by Semaphor »

bluedino wrote: post #109
Semaphor wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A pure CT Scan in Germany (paid for by public health insurance unless you do one for fun), without anything else (consultation, contrast materials, etc.) is billed 110-170 € (USD 120-190). Considering labor is more expensive here, that sounds comparable.

But what is the 'real cost'? Is it that much higher in Germany than the USA? What does the CT tech make, how much was the machine to buy, how expensive is the rent where the machine is installed, what are electricity costs...

I’m confused, US costs are far higher, so I don’t think I understand what you are asking.

Re: Food Packaging

#129

Post by vestrigi »

LargoLasskhyfv wrote: post #119
vestrigi wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So you mean local bottling at each store with standard bottles? I like the idea, but the challenges are quite tough. - No branding/consumer information possible on the bottle - carbonized beverages can‘t just be poured in free air like juice or milk, a large facility is needed - beverage stores would have to pump dozens of different beverages through one machine, that would always mix a little bit of the last filling…

Let's ignore the machines for a while(waves hands...). I think that is possible. Think of the the ones giving all sorts of coffee in a cup, but also soups, like in some companies canteens. I've thought about the carbonizing thing. Let's say there are glass cylinders of common sizes and proportions, made out of light, and nearly indestructible laboratory glassware. Everybody has a few of them, like knife, fork and spo…

You’re right about the bakeries, if they were willing to do that they might as well start out with a filling machine, doesn’t have to cover all products at once :)

Actually I’ve seen this at one or two upscale supermarkets. They had a larger filling station for cereal, candy and other dry goods but it wasn’t the supermarket itself that sold those. Similar to an in-store “Unverpackt-Laden” (no packaging store).

In my opinion it would be more realistic to start out with dry goods to save emissions. The German bottling system is not so bad to begin with and could be improved later.

Re: Food Packaging

#130

Post by aldebran »

simondotau wrote: post #44
aldebran wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some people do. 1. Reduce plastic consumption as much as you can. 2. Use reusable bags 3. Choose packaging that contains less plastic. This is truly horrible in the US. Apple sauce containers for kids have so much unnecessary plastic. I mean the ones with the fancy caps that are big only to appeal to kids. And to reduce your carbon footprint further - controversial point incoming - reduce or stop eating meat. “But, a…

Fascinatingly, single use plastic bags are so impossibly thin that you'd have to reuse a reusable bag more times than they're likely to last. I have not seen any data, but I'm willing to bet that our consumption of plastic has increased, with any reduction in single use plastic bags more than offset by an increase in "reusable" bags. If instead of normalising the use of reusable bags, we normalised soft plastics (LDP…

This is a myopic view.

My state recently started charging for bags. Guess what? People carry groceries in their hands when possible. Many bring their own bag plastic reusable bags.

It’s not just the energy required to create them. It’s that they’re virtually indestructible. They litter. They fly away. They break and leak plastic everywhere in the environment leading to microplastic found in blood of wildlife.

And this is just scratching the surface. I know it sounds like an educated view and it’s not entirely wrong but there’s more to it than what appears. Plastic is a problem and the less of it we use the better we and our next generations will be.

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