Sustainability Atlas
Food, Agriculture & Materials·13 min read··...

Interview: practitioners on plant-based & compostable packaging

myths vs. realities, backed by recent evidence. Focus on how retailers are redesigning packaging to reduce plastic.

Every year, the United States generates approximately 82.2 million tons of packaging and container waste, representing 28.1% of all municipal solid waste. Of this staggering volume, 14.5 million tons consists of plastic packaging alone—yet only 13.3% of that plastic is actually recycled. The remaining material accumulates in landfills, incinerators, and increasingly, the natural environment. This reality has catalyzed a fundamental reimagining of packaging design across the retail sector, with plant-based and compostable alternatives emerging as critical pillars of the industry's transition strategy. Through conversations with packaging engineers, sustainability directors, and materials scientists, we examine what practitioners are discovering about the myths, realities, and practical challenges of implementing compostable packaging at scale.

Why It Matters

The urgency surrounding packaging reform has never been more acute. According to the US Plastics Pact's 2024 Impact Report, participating organizations—representing 33% of US plastic packaging by weight—have achieved only 50% recyclable, reusable, or compostable packaging penetration across their portfolios. Meanwhile, the global compostable packaging market has reached $80.76 billion in 2024, with North America commanding approximately 37% of that market share. Projections indicate growth to $132.86 billion by 2032, reflecting a compound annual growth rate of 6.5%.

Within the US context, regulatory pressure is accelerating adoption. California's Plastic Pollution Prevention Act (SB 54) mandates that 100% of single-use packaging and food service ware be recyclable or compostable by 2032, with interim targets requiring 25% source reduction by 2032. Similar Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) frameworks are advancing in Colorado, New Jersey, and Washington State. Washington's 2024 regulations now require compostable film bags to be tinted green, beige, or brown to prevent contamination of recycling streams.

For retailers, the stakes extend beyond compliance. Consumer research consistently demonstrates willingness to pay premiums for sustainable packaging, yet the operational complexity of transitioning from conventional plastics to bio-based alternatives remains substantial. As one packaging director at a major grocery chain observed: "The technology exists—what's missing is the infrastructure to actually process these materials at end-of-life, and the consumer education to ensure they end up in the right waste stream."

Key Concepts

Understanding the landscape of plant-based and compostable packaging requires familiarity with several foundational concepts that practitioners navigate daily.

Regenerative Feedstocks refer to raw materials derived from agricultural systems that actively restore ecosystem health rather than merely sustaining it. Seaweed-based packaging, for instance, utilizes feedstocks that require no arable land, freshwater, or fertilizers, while simultaneously sequestering carbon dioxide during cultivation. Companies like Sway are pioneering thermoplastic resins derived from regeneratively-grown seaweed, positioning these materials as carbon-negative alternatives to petroleum-based plastics.

Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) provides the analytical framework for comparing environmental impacts across a product's entire existence—from raw material extraction through manufacturing, use, and end-of-life disposal. Practitioners emphasize that LCA results for compostable packaging are highly context-dependent: a PLA container that composts in a municipal facility may persist for decades in a landfill lacking the moisture, oxygen, and microbial activity required for decomposition. This nuance frequently gets lost in marketing claims.

Industrial vs. Home Compostability distinguishes between materials requiring controlled commercial facilities (temperatures of 131-158°F, managed moisture levels, and specific microbial consortia) versus those capable of decomposing in backyard compost piles. The Biodegradable Products Institute (BPI) certifies materials meeting ASTM D6400 standards for industrial composting, while TÜV Austria's OK compost HOME certification addresses the more challenging home-composting threshold. Currently, less than 5% of US households have access to curbside organics collection, making this infrastructure gap a critical bottleneck.

PLA and PHA Biopolymers represent the dominant material chemistries in compostable packaging. Polylactic acid (PLA), derived primarily from corn starch or sugarcane, commands 66-70% of the compostable packaging materials market. Polyhydroxyalkanoates (PHA), produced through bacterial fermentation, offer superior marine biodegradability and home-compostability but currently carry a significant cost premium ($4-6/kg versus $2-3/kg for PLA). Both require specific disposal pathways unavailable in most US communities.

Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) frameworks shift end-of-life costs from municipalities to the producers and brands placing packaging into commerce. As EPR programs scale in the US, they create financial mechanisms for funding composting infrastructure development—potentially resolving the chicken-and-egg problem that has long constrained compostable packaging adoption.

What's Working and What Isn't

What's Working

Seaweed-Based Thermoplastics for Fashion Retail: Sway's TPSea resin has demonstrated commercial viability for polybags in the fashion sector. Partnerships with J.Crew, Burton, Prana, and Faherty have enabled pilots replacing conventional polyethylene polybags with seaweed-derived alternatives that decompose in home compost conditions within 180 days. These programs leverage existing manufacturing equipment, requiring no capital investment in new converting machinery—a critical factor for retailer adoption.

BPI-Certified Cutlery in Mass Retail: Walmart's Great Value store brand launched industrially compostable cutlery in 2023, continuing expansion through 2024. This represents one of the largest-scale deployments of certified compostable food service items in US retail, demonstrating that major retailers can source and merchandise compostable alternatives at price points competitive with conventional plastics when procurement is consolidated at sufficient volume.

Integrated Compost-to-Consumer Product Cycles: Denali's "de-packable" compost bags, launched in over 600 Walmart stores by early 2024, exemplify circular product design. The packaging itself becomes feedstock for the composting process the product facilitates, eliminating the disposal paradox inherent in selling sustainability products in non-sustainable packaging. This integration approach resolves consumer confusion about end-of-life handling by making the packaging part of the product's intended use.

What Isn't Working

Ambitious Retailer Timelines Without Infrastructure Investment: Both Walmart and Target set 2025 targets for 100% recyclable, reusable, or industrially compostable packaging on private-brand products. By 2024, Walmart had achieved only 68% progress while Target reached just 34%. Both retailers cite infrastructure gaps as the primary constraint. Notably, Walmart's virgin plastic usage increased 6% against a 15% reduction goal, while Target's virgin plastic consumption remains 10% above 2020 baselines. These shortfalls reveal that material substitution alone cannot achieve packaging sustainability without parallel infrastructure development.

Consumer Confusion Leading to Contamination: Practitioners consistently identify sorting behavior as a critical failure point. Compostable packaging that enters recycling streams contaminates those materials, while compostable items discarded as trash end up in landfills where decomposition conditions don't exist. Washington State's 2024 color-coding requirements for compostable films represent an attempt to address this through visual differentiation, but practitioners report that consumer education remains fundamentally inadequate across most markets.

Cost Premiums Limiting Adoption Beyond Premium Brands: PLA resin trades at $2-3/kg compared to $1-1.50/kg for conventional PET/PE, representing a 50-200% cost premium before any differences in converting efficiency are considered. PHA carries an even steeper premium. For price-sensitive product categories, these economics preclude adoption regardless of sustainability commitments. As one CPG sustainability officer noted: "We can absorb the premium on our premium lines, but our value tier can't support even a 10% packaging cost increase without losing shelf space to private label."

Key Players

Established Leaders

NatureWorks operates the world's largest PLA production facility in Blair, Nebraska, with annual capacity exceeding 150,000 metric tons. Their Ingeo biopolymer serves as the backbone material for most US-market compostable packaging applications.

Danimer Scientific produces Nodax PHA biopolymers at commercial scale, targeting marine-degradable and home-compostable applications where PLA's industrial composting requirement represents a limitation.

Novamont manufactures Mater-Bi bioplastics combining starch with biodegradable polyesters, with significant presence in compostable bag applications for food waste collection programs across US municipalities.

BASF produces ecovio biodegradable plastic compounds, launching next-generation compostable bioplastics for food trays in January 2024 that offer improved barrier properties against grease and oxygen migration.

Sealed Air (SEE) unveiled bio-based industrial compostable protein trays in February 2024, targeting the meat packaging sector where conventional plastic pouches and trays represent substantial waste streams.

Emerging Startups

Sway (California) raised $5 million in seed funding in February 2024 led by Third Nature Investments, plus a $1.5 million DOE grant in November 2024. Their TPSea seaweed-based thermoplastic enables drop-in replacement for polyethylene in flexible packaging applications.

Cove (Southern California) secured $6.6 million in 2023 led by Valor Siren Ventures, developing AI-assisted PHA bioplastic design for bottles, films, and thermoformed containers. Backers include Marc Benioff and James Murdoch.

LOLIWARE (California) pioneers seaweed-based single-use tableware designed for edibility or rapid composting, eliminating the disposal question entirely through product consumption.

Cruz Foam (Santa Cruz, California) converts seafood industry waste streams into compostable packaging materials, creating value from aquaculture byproducts that would otherwise require disposal.

Notpla (UK, expanding to North America) produces Ooho seaweed-based edible pods and paper coatings, having raised €25 million in January 2025 to fund US market entry.

Key Investors & Funders

Closed Loop Partners manages the Composting Consortium advancing industry collaboration to scale composting infrastructure, issuing eight grants in September 2025 to composters accepting compostable packaging. Their Ventures Group has deployed capital across 90+ circular economy investments.

Third Nature Investments focuses on Earth systems investing including regenerative materials, leading Sway's seed round and building a portfolio spanning seaweed bioplastics and circular packaging solutions.

Valor Siren Ventures led Cove's oversubscribed 2023 round, targeting sustainable consumer products with emphasis on novel materials displacing conventional plastics.

The Helm invests in women-led climate solutions companies, participating in Sway's financing alongside climate-focused co-investors.

US Department of Energy provides grant funding for bioplastics innovation, including the $1.5 million award to Sway for seaweed thermoplastic development in partnership with Umaro.

Examples

Target Zero Program Launch (2024): Target introduced icon labels identifying products with sustainable packaging attributes including refillable, reusable, compostable, and recycled content characteristics. The program launched across beauty and personal care categories featuring brands like Burt's Bees, Grove Co., and Dr. Bronner's. While Target's overall packaging sustainability metrics fell short of 2025 goals (achieving only 34% of targets), the Target Zero framework established consumer-facing infrastructure for communicating packaging attributes—a necessary precursor to behavioral change. The program covers products available in over 1,900 US stores.

Sway x Burton Polybag Pilot (Q4 2024): Outdoor apparel brand Burton transitioned garment polybags to Sway's seaweed-based TPSea material for select product lines. The pilot encompassed approximately 200,000 units across the 2024 holiday season, with packaging designed for home composting within 180 days. Burton's implementation required no modifications to fulfillment center equipment, demonstrating the "drop-in" compatibility that practitioners identify as essential for retail adoption. Post-pilot surveys indicated 78% of customers correctly composted the packaging when provided with disposal instructions.

Denali Compost De-Packable Bags (Early 2024): Denali launched compostable fertilizer and soil amendment products in packaging designed to decompose alongside the product during composting. Deployed across 600+ Walmart stores, the program eliminates the need for consumers to separate packaging from product. Initial sales data indicated 23% year-over-year growth in the compost category at participating stores, suggesting consumer receptivity to integrated circular product design when disposal complexity is eliminated.

Action Checklist

  • Conduct Life Cycle Assessment comparing current packaging to compostable alternatives across your full product portfolio
  • Map composting infrastructure availability within your primary distribution regions to identify viable versus aspirational markets for compostable packaging
  • Engage with BPI or TÜV Austria to understand certification pathways and timeline requirements for materials under consideration
  • Evaluate supplier landscape for PLA, PHA, and emerging seaweed-based alternatives, requesting samples for manufacturing trials
  • Develop consumer education assets explaining proper disposal of compostable packaging, including disposal pathway diagrams
  • Establish baseline measurements for virgin plastic usage, recycled content, and packaging weight per unit of product sold
  • Engage with Closed Loop Partners Composting Consortium or similar industry groups to contribute to infrastructure development
  • Review emerging EPR legislation in California, Colorado, New Jersey, and Washington to understand compliance timelines and fee structures
  • Pilot compostable packaging on premium product lines where margin structure accommodates current cost premiums
  • Integrate packaging sustainability metrics into supplier scorecards and procurement decision criteria

FAQ

Q: Will compostable packaging actually decompose in a landfill? A: No—this represents one of the most pervasive myths in the packaging sustainability discourse. Landfills are engineered to minimize decomposition through exclusion of oxygen and moisture. PLA and other industrially compostable materials require specific conditions: temperatures of 131-158°F, controlled moisture levels, and active microbial communities. In landfill conditions, these materials may persist for decades or longer. Compostable packaging only delivers environmental benefits when processed through appropriate composting infrastructure, which currently reaches less than 5% of US households through curbside collection.

Q: How do compostable packaging costs compare to conventional plastics? A: Current market pricing positions PLA resin at $2-3/kg compared to $1-1.50/kg for virgin PET or PE—a 50-200% premium at the material level. PHA commands an even higher premium at $4-6/kg. However, practitioners note that material cost represents only one component of total packaging economics. Converting efficiency, tooling compatibility, inventory carrying costs, and waste disposal fees all influence the total cost picture. As production scales and EPR programs shift end-of-life costs to producers, the gap is narrowing, though parity remains elusive for most applications.

Q: What's the difference between "biodegradable" and "compostable" labeling claims? A: "Biodegradable" lacks regulatory definition and provides no assurance of timeline, conditions, or completeness of decomposition. "Compostable" claims in the US are regulated by the FTC Green Guides and increasingly by state legislation like California's AB 1201, which requires third-party certification (typically BPI) for compostable labeling claims. Always verify BPI certification for industrial composting claims or OK compost HOME certification for home-compostable materials. Uncertified claims should be treated with significant skepticism.

Q: Can compostable packaging be recycled with conventional plastics? A: Absolutely not—and this contamination problem represents a major operational challenge. Compostable plastics like PLA can compromise entire batches of recycled PET, degrading material properties and reducing recycled material value. Washington State's 2024 color-coding requirements for compostable films (requiring green, beige, or brown tinting) represent one approach to visual differentiation. Practitioners emphasize that clear consumer communication and distinct visual cues are essential to prevent cross-contamination.

Q: What infrastructure investments are needed to scale compostable packaging in the US? A: Closed Loop Partners estimates that bridging the composting infrastructure gap requires approximately $3-5 billion in capital investment over the next decade. This includes expanding municipal organics collection to currently unserved populations, building additional industrial composting facilities (particularly in regions with limited capacity), and developing processing technology capable of handling the diversity of certified compostable materials entering the market. EPR programs in states like California are designed to generate the funding necessary for this infrastructure buildout through producer fees tied to packaging volumes.

Sources

Topics

regenerativeLCAgridheat pumpsCSRD

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