bioserie iPhone covers deliver outstanding protection with a considerably lower environmental impact versus regular plastic cases.
Any regular plastic case you've used until now was made from petrochemicals (oil and/or natural gas). Conventional plastic cases rely on increasingly scarce resources, and are not environmentally friendly - in the process of being manufactured, they cause between 2 - 7 times their own weight in greenhouse gases to be emitted into our atmosphere (a little known fact about all those plastics that we so take for granted in our everyday lives).
Because bioserie products are made from PLANTS, not oil; they use considerably less petroleum and contribute considerably less greenhouse gases to the atmosphere than traditional plastic materials. Furthermore, unlike its plastic counterparts potentially do, bioserie bioplastic covers do not pollute the environment once discarded as they don't contain toxic materials that come from petrochemicals.
For some of our high performance and specialty products we choose renewable or recyclable components such as glass and aluminum, to push the limits of design and performance with the least amount of environmental impact. All such components are Reach/ROHS compliant, in addition to being individually recyclable.
Your bioserie bioplastic cover fits into all existing disposal systems. These vary widely around the world, and even within specific localities. They include landfill, incineration, compost and recycle.
Despite looking like a great set of choices, the unfortunate reality is that many cities and municipalities around the world still landfill almost everything. At bioserie, we don't accept this waste of our precious resources and that's why, step-by-step, we aspire to bring you attractive products that offer real end of life alternatives to the sad landfill fate.
As you can probably tell, this is a subject near to our heart, and something we've put a lot of time into researching and understanding. We want to share with you our thinking, and what we have found:
- Landfill: Not where we want our bioserie cover to end up, but that's unfortunately what will happen to it in most places when you're done with it. A little known fact is that this is where almost all plastics, especially the kinds used in phone cases end up today as they are NOT recyclable at the post consumer level (see 'recycling' for details). Not only do these discarded plastic phone cases add to the ugliness of landfill sites, they may release toxic matter and pollute the soil, water and air.
Even if your bioserie cover should end up in a landfill, it has had a much lower environmental impact along the way than any regular plastic product and will not pollute the environment, as it is made of plants and does not contain toxic materials.
This is one of the end of life options we're most excited about, but we temper ourselves too, as we realize we may be a bit ahead of the curve here. This is why:
Yes, Ingeo™ - the material we use to produce bioserie bioplastic covers – is industrially compostable. We're reviewing bioserie products right now with 3rd party certification authorities to confirm their compostability and biobased material content.
The more important point here is what "compostable" means! Simply put, it means that composting is currently carried out in industrial composters, where temperature, moisture and turning are carefully regulated. Due to variability in home composting conditions, we do not recommend bioserie products for use in home composting. Therefore, the key for proper composting is finding industrial composting facilities in your area that are up to speed in handling these new composting opportunities. Though we realize that this is not always going to be possible as such facilities are for the moment limited in number, the infrastructure is growing fast with the increasing use of bioplastics. We expect soon to see composting widely available at a post consumer level. Listings of composting facilities around the world are widely available on the Internet; for the USA, you can try www.findacomposter.com.
bioserie bioplastic covers are made of compostable materials, and we are getting ready for launching more compostable products (the cleanest end of life option for any product) while composting infrastructures continue to spread and flourish worldwide.
Let's get specific here and talk about the US as an example. In the US, where plastics are involved in just about everything, ONLY 6.8% of them are recycled today.
In fact, in spite of the broad array of plastics used, only two types of plastics are actually being recovered and recycled at the post consumer level. These plastics are PET (typically used to bottle soda, water, juice) and high-density polyethylene – HDPE (typically used to bottle milk and laundry detergents).
Conventional plastic and silicone phone cases are made of materials like polycarbonate, acrylic, ABS and silicone – NONE of which is practically recyclable at the post consumer level! As such, almost all end up in landfills.
The unfortunate reality is that the underlying economics of recycling are often unattractive to producers. For those involved in making the plastics, it's often cheaper to simply make new plastics from new starting materials, ie. oil or gas, fresh out of the ground.
This is where the recycling potential for bioserie products becomes exciting. Unlike conventional oil- based plastic cases, bioserie bioplastic covers can be simply and economically recycled as the material it's made of - Ingeo™ - can be remade into another bioplastic product again and again. By contrast, oil-based incumbent plastics are typically "down-cycled" into products of diminishing value such as decking, and are ultimately destined for landfill. Our glass+ bioplastic covers' plastic casing is made of biopolyamide (fully derived from plants), it is recyclable, and we're already recycling manufacturing rejects into new product during manufacture.
So bioserie products are fit for economically viable, true closed-loop, cradle-to-cradle solutions. However, it's a bit like the compost situation – the system isn't there yet to fully take advantage of this. But then again, if we just wait for things to change, we'll be waiting for a long time. We believe in driving change, one small step at a time, and that's why we're making bioserie products out of fundamentally more responsible materials.
Complicated? Yes, it is, and that's why we at bioserie appreciate you taking the time to read through this. We're excited about the journey we're on and we invite you to join us in our efforts for a cleaner, more pristine environment.