After we hear about responsible sourcing within the context of sustainable packaging, it’s normally an advocacy for using either renewable resources from properly-managed sources, or non-renewable assets from the recycling stream instead of virgin sources. This broad steering certainly covers the main considerations of accountable sourcing, however an upcoming U.S. Securities and Change Fee vote led me to consider that there are greater dimensions for us to consider.
The vote applies to a provision of the 2010 Dodd-Frank Act that may require companies to disclose their usage of conflict minerals from the Democratic Republic of Congo and the surrounding area. There are four primary minerals of concern: gold, wolframite (source of tungsten), columbite-tantalie (source of the component tantalum), and cassiterite, which is an important source of tin. Many of the scrutiny around these minerals happens with makers of electronics, and at first look there’s not much of a connection to packaging. My pondering was “definitely no gold in packaging, can’t think about there’s any tungsten, no clue what tantalum is, and tin would possibly only show up in small quantities in tin cans (that are made virtually entirely from steel, in case you didn’t know).” But, life cycle inventory knowledge always reveals a number of materials that one wouldn’t normally associate with the major packaging materials, and sure enough, there’s a measurable quantity of tin used to make most sorts of packaging.
Organic compounds containing tin can be used as catalysts, stabilizers, or polymerization aids to make plastics. Tin is an alloying ingredient in aluminum. Glass containers have a coating of a tin-bearing compound. And sure, tin cans are indeed coated with tin. On a kilogram-by-kilogram foundation, it’s actually glass containers that use probably the most tin. Second place? Recycled folding boxboard. Of all of the supplies, I haven’t any clue how tin elements into making recycled folding boxboard – if you already know, fill me in, please.
Even so, the amount of tin used is comparatively tiny. Utilizing the example of glass containers, a tough calculation tells me that about fifty two kilograms of tin can pancakes [evelynefusco29.hatenadiary.com] were utilized in all of the container glass produced in 2010 – that’s 52 kilograms of tin to make 8.5 billion kilograms of container glass. Fifty two kilograms of tin? That’s not a lot. To place that in perspective, Wikipedia tells us that almost 300 million kilograms of tin were produced in 2006.
Wikipedia additionally tells us that someplace around 80-90% of the world’s tin is produced in China and Indonesia. So what are the probabilities that the tin utilized in packaging comes from the Democratic Republic of Congo, where it is alleged that the sale of minerals goes to funding the battle there? Probably pretty low. Nonetheless, it appears quite plausible that someplace in someone’s packaging supply chain, there’s at least a miniscule prevalence of battle tin. Addressing our usage of tin in packaging most likely ought to not be high on our checklist of how to make packaging more sustainable, however it’s one thing to remember.
My takeaway is this: there may be an absolute plethora of supplies that go into making packaging. If we would like packaging to be truly sustainable, we have to study each input. We can’t overgeneralize packaging and enhance our usage of only the most important raw materials. Issues like tin, nonetheless small our usage is, can’t be ignored, especially when lives might hinge on it.