Our Solution to the Plastic Pollution Crisis

To address this environmental tragedy, we design and manufacture eco-friendly packaging for consumer products.  Our patent-pending (#13/872,687) Karta-Pack™ is a direct replacement for the toxic plastic blister pack.  It’s comprised of 100% recycled pulp and paper, contains no plastic of any kind, and can be composted or recycled when discarded.

The Karta-Pack™ responds to an urgent need for improved retail packages that significantly reduce the negative impact on the environment but also provide consumers with enhanced functionality and design.  In essence, our Karta-Pack™ provides all of the display benefits of plastic blister packaging but without the toxicity and danger to people and planet.

Even though molded pulp technology is commonly associated with the egg-carton or used ‘behind-the-scenes’ as protective packaging for costly or fragile consumer items, PulpWorks has elevated this material to a new level of retail elegance.  Employing different colors, textures, and designs, the innovative Karta-Pack™ has attracted customers in categories as diverse as beauty care and electronics.

Currently, with our strategic partner, the Mohawk Paper Co., we are examining how a new source of agricultural waste as well as the science of nanotechnology can impact the molded pulp packaging industry.  These innovations have the potential to create a “super pulp” – with increased durability and moisture resistance – for countless new plastic replacement packaging applications.

PulpWorks will be a market leader with this proprietary technology.

This is our follow-up to a previous post, The Problem that PulpWorks is Solving.

The Problem that PulpWorks is Solving

PulpWorks, Inc. was founded in response to a worldwide plastic pollution crisis. Merely one example, polyvinyl chloride (PVC), accounts for 7 billion pounds of landfill annually. When plastics such as PVC are broken down in landfills, methane, a very powerful greenhouse gas, is released contributing to our global warming emergency. When incinerated, PVC releases cancer-causing dioxins that harm the immune and reproductive systems with links to breast cancer, as well.

As a popular packaging material, the production of PVC alone is responsible for unleashing 130 million pounds of CO2e into our atmosphere each year. Further, PVC’s principal (60%) raw material is chlorine, and energy-intensive chlorine production for PVC packaging consumes an estimated 5 billion kilowatt-hours  – comparable, incredibly, to the annual output of some nuclear power plants.

And then there’s the plastic pollution crisis in our oceans. We have massive swirling islands (gyres) of plastic packaging debris in all of the world’s oceans. The Pacific Gyre is twice the size of Texas. The dangers to sea life and the impact on the fishing industry are well documented.

A noteworthy related issue is the hundreds of thousands of persons visiting emergency rooms annually as a result of lacerations suffered while attempting to open plastic blister packaging. (60,000 in the UK alone, last year.) Seniors, in particular, have little tolerance for this dangerous packaging. PulpWorks’ easy-to-open feature addresses this significant concern among the planet’s fastest growing age group.

Our sustainable packaging addresses the health of our planet as well as its citizens.