As Plastic Free July® wraps up, Head Magazine is exploring the pros, cons and future of hemp bioplastics. Logistically, these bioplastics can’t render a plastic-free world anytime soon, as the current production facilities and specialized recycling facilities are lacking. Scientifically, however, cannabis-derived plastics are indeed capable of wholly replacing fossil-fuel-derived plastics. If this were to happen, the accumulation rate of plastic-driven pollution throughout Earth’s air, land and sea would go from warp speed to slow motion.
Environmentalists aren’t the only ones who should be excited about that possibility, either; even people who couldn’t care less about the plight of the planet are in for a treat. The United Nations estimates that humans ingest a credit card’s worth of plastic every week because of ubiquitous microplastic pollution from our plastic food and beverage containers, plastic toothbrushes and mesh sponges, plastic phones, plastic toys, and so forth – compounded by the presence of microplastics in all parts of the food chain. Look around you right now, and you’ll see that you’re surrounded by plastic all day, every day, exposing it to your mouth, skin, lungs, stomach – it’s in you, whether you feel it there or not.
And that affects something no one couldn’t care less about: health. Now, if you don’t care about your health, consider that your children and pets (but I repeat myself) are on a partial plastic diet right along with you, having their health compromised too. So, even if pollution solutions don’t rev you up, read on to get the whole picture of what cannabis could do for you while serving as Earth’s superhero.
Photo Credit: UF/IFAS Photo by Tyler Jones / CC BY-NC-ND 2.0 via Creative Commons
Traditional Plastic: Then and Now
Ironically, when plastic was invented in 1862, it was meant to solve an environmental problem. As the Science Museum in London, England, explains in its feature on the history of plastic, the increasing scarcity of animal-derived materials (e.g., ivory from elephants, shells from tortoises) spawned the need for a semi-synthetic alternative. Inventors set to work, and after many of them failed to produce a substitute, Alexander Parkes succeeded. It wasn’t until 1907 that fully synthetic plastic was created though, a patented invention of Leo Baekeland.
According to the United Nations’ (UN) Environment Program, until the 1970s, the amount of waste from plastic goods was manageable. Between that decade and the 1990s though, both plastic production and plastic waste more than tripled. Then, between 2000 and 2010, plastic waste rose more in 10 years than it had in the previous 40 years.
Today, we produce about 400 million tons of plastic waste annually; by 2050, that statistic will likely be 1.1 billion tons. In the U.S., on average, each person produces 4.4 pounds of plastic waste daily. Worldwide, plastic is already in the fossil record for the current geological era – Anthropocene, also known as the Plastics Age. (The Stone, Bronze and Iron ages used up all the dignity in historical periods.)
According to the United Nations’ (UN) Environment Program, until the 1970s, the amount of waste from plastic goods was manageable. Between that decade and the 1990s though, both plastic production and plastic waste more than tripled./Photo by CARTIST/Pexels.com
Hemp Bioplastic: Fast Facts
“Plastic” Defined
The term “plastic” refers to materials that can be formed and molded under heat and pressure. The production of plastic requires four basic steps: 1) Acquire raw material; 2) Synthesize a basic polymer; 3) Compound the polymer into a usable fraction; and 4) Mold or shape the plastic.
“Bioplastic” Defined
The prefix “bio” is added to the word “plastic” whenever you’re referring to plastic materials that come from renewable biomass sources. Hemp is one, and some others are vegetable oils and fats, corn starch, sawdust, straw, and recycled food waste.
Hemp Bioplastic Ingredients
Hemp bioplastic is made of the lipids and cellulose found in the stalk and seeds of hemp (i.e., cannabis) plants. It is produced by extracting cellulose from the stalks and fibers of hemp and converting it into a polymer that can be molded into various shapes and forms. This is done with a bioplastic resin derived from another renewable source, such as corn starch or sugar cane. Interestingly, even the lowest-grade (waste-grade) hemp biomass is effective in plastic production, as no cannabinoid content is desired.
Dried hemp /Photo by D-Kuru, CC BY-SA 3.0 AT via Wikimedia Commons
Hemp Bioplastic Manufacturing Process
The exact process of making hemp bioplastics varies by manufacturer and intended use of the final product. However, it’s simple enough to do on your own, according to hemp bioplastic manufacturer EuroPlas, who provides a step-by-step DIY guide. All you need is hemp fibers, hemp oil, a plasticizer, a heat source, mixing tools and a mold – as well as the proper personal protective equipment and qualified supervision, of course.
Hemp Bioplastic Products
Hemp bioplastic can be used to make cellophane, rayon, celluloid, packaging, consumer goods, containers, bags, films, tiles, electronics, toys, cosmetics, bottles, boats, furniture, automotive parts and much more. In 1941, Henry Ford even produced a prototype car whose body was made from a plastic composite that consisted of 70% hemp fiber mixed with straw and sisal. He demonstrated the strength of the hemp composite by beating the car with a club and leaving no dents in the bodywork. The car was even powered by biofuels from hemp, too.
Hemp Bioplastic Structural Integrity
Hemp bioplastic has exceptional thermal stability, is fire-resistant and does not allow UV radiation to pass through. Also, it’s lighter, 3.5 times stronger and 5 times stiffer than the most common type of plastic, polypropylene. You can even get “hempcrete,” which consists of the woody inner part of the stem and is used to make building blocks.
Hemp vs. Other Bioplastic Raw Materials
The key ingredient for making plastic (traditional and bio) is cellulose, and hemp contains 65% to 70% cellulose. Cotton contains up to 90%, flax contains 65% to 75%, and wood contains about 40%. However, those materials don’t offer the wealth of secondary benefits (covered in the following sections) that hemp does.
Grades of Hemp Bioplastic
There are currently two grades of hemp bioplastics being manufactured: bio-composite hemp plastic (usually 30% to 40% hemp fiber mixed with other plastic compounds) and 100% hemp plastics. Nearly all hemp-derived plastics produced today are bio-composites containing only 5% to 30% hemp. For those, hemp fibers are used to reinforce an existing polymer. These materials can’t be recycled, so the benefits are comparatively negligible.
Hemp plastic cosmetic jar and shampoo caps/ Photo by JeremiahDutton, CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons
Hemp Bioplastic’s Six Solutions to Plastic Pollution
1. Reuse things instead of burying, burning or dumping them.
Even if you intentionally discard plastics in the recycling bin, only 9% of the plastics that could be recycled actually are recycled. This has to do with the intricacies of sorting recyclables, the standard practice of exporting mountains of trash to impoverished countries, and other commonplace sordid methods of making refuse disappear. One-quarter of plastic waste ends up being mismanaged (as in “lost” and dumped), 12% is incinerated, and what’s left is landfilled. As it is, half of all the plastic produced is designed for single use anyhow. Packaging takes up 36% of plastic production alone, and 85% of that ends up landfilled or mismanaged.
Hemp bioplastic trounces traditional plastic in terms of renewal. Whereas some plastic can be recycled, all bioplastic containing only hemp can be recycled – unendingly, no less. Moreover, pure hemp bioplastic doesn’t require the elaborate sorting scheme that traditional and bio-composite plastics do, making it a realistic plan to carry out. This is because the fibers in hemp can be separated from the hurd (woody core of the plant) and used to create new products, whereas some other bioplastics cannot be easily recycled.
Petroleum plastic bag next to decomposing hemp plastic bag/ Photo by Tracey McTague, CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons
2. Reduce the volume of ground-confined waste.
If trash does have to be consigned to dirt, then the priority there is to make sure that the waste is only renting out space on Earth for a short while. In the case of hemp bioplastic, the waste is there for three months to a few years (the average is six months though) before disappearing entirely. As EuroPlas explains, microorganisms in the soil and water can enzymatically degrade the cellulose and other organic components in hemp plastic, returning them to their natural constituents without leaving harmful residues. However, biodegradable plastics need to be sent to commercial composting facilities for efficient disposal, not to massive landfills, and these facilities aren’t available to everyone. So, that does introduce a complication.
In the case of traditional plastic, the waste is in a landfill for as little as 20 years (one water bottle alone takes that long) and as much as 1,000 years – at which point it isn’t even gone, just microscopic. Because it derives from fossil fuels, its hydrocarbon polymer base will remain unchanged forever, making plastic, in environmental terms, permanent. Meanwhile, more and more waste is being added around and above that waste all that time. Bioplastics News estimates that 91% of all plastics are disposed of in the natural environment. As National Geographic reports, enough plastic is thrown away every year to circle Earth four times.
In the case of traditional plastic, the waste is in a landfill for as little as 20 years (one water bottle alone takes that long) and as much as 1,000 years.
3. Reduce the harmful substances released into or trapped in the air.
When the cellulose needed to make plastic is produced from petroleum, the process used to obtain it is hydraulic fracturing, better known as “fracking.” This process requires drilling operators to force water, sand and a mix of chemicals into horizontally drilled wells, causing the shale rock to crack and release natural gas or oil – often accompanied by toxins. Additional toxins are then released into the air throughout the process of turning petroleum byproducts into finished plastic. Later, when the plastic waste is burned, the damage to the atmosphere is compounded. The use and disposal of traditional, fossil-fuel-based plastics is expected to reach nearly 20% of the world’s greenhouse gas (carbon dioxide) emissions by 2040. By 2050, the plastic industry is expected to account for 20% of oil consumption.
By contrast, the amount of carbon dioxide emitted during the entire process of harvesting, processing and transporting hemp is less than the amount of carbon dioxide that cannabis removes from the atmosphere. This makes hemp production “carbon-neutral” or even “carbon-negative,” which means that it’s either not further contaminating the air or it’s decontaminating the air, respectively. Cannabis actually removes twice the amount of carbon dioxide that an entire forest removes, per hectare. One hectare of hemp can absorb between 8 and 15 metric tons of carbon dioxide; a forest – depending on the trees, region and other factors – absorbs between 2 and 6 metric tons of carbon dioxide. Ultimately, the bioplastic produced by hemp contains only 25% to 35%, per kilogram, of the carbon in fossil-fuel-based plastic.
The use and disposal of traditional, fossil-fuel-based plastics is expected to reach nearly 20% of the world’s greenhouse gas (carbon dioxide) emissions by 2040. By 2050, the plastic industry is expected to account for 20% of oil consumption.Image by Mak Thorpe, CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons
4. Reduce the plastic waste that the body ingests.
Microplastics, which are the synthetic polymer compounds that form when large plastic materials are fragmented and micronized to a size of ≤5 millimeters, enter the body through inhalation and absorption. They then accumulate in the lungs, liver, spleen and kidneys. They’ve even been found in human blood. Even babies in the womb end up ingesting them, according to a study published in “Environment International” in 2021. The National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences estimates that 93% of Americans over the age of 6 test positive for Bisphenol A (BPA), a chemical in plastic linked to cancer, diabetes, impaired immunity and more. BPA is but one of the numerous endocrine disruptors found in traditional plastic.
Microplastics exist because traditional plastic is incapable of total degradation. By contrast, hemp bioplastic (pure, not bio-composite) not only degrades 100% but also doesn’t contain any of the toxins in fossil-fuel-based plastic, such as BPA, toluene, benzene and phthalates. So, even if it were to linger, hemp bioplastic wouldn’t be poisoning anyone.
Photo courtesy of Australian Institute of Marine Science CC BY 3.0 AU
5. Reduce soil erosion and soil degradation to restore and protect ecosystems.
Erosion compromises soil’s structure and salinity while degrading its nutrients. Eventually, the soil can no longer maintain itself, and the result is desertification. In the process, pollution increases along with sedimentation in waterways (streams, rivers, etc.). This is exacerbated by the aforementioned fracking process used to obtain the petroleum needed to extract cellulose to make traditional plastic. By contrast, hemp cultivation cleans the soil, and the plant even gives 60% of its own nutrients back to the land – all while producing zero toxic byproducts. The soil is better off if hemp is there, basically.
6. Reduce the microplastics and harmful chemicals released into water.
Every year, 8 million tons of discarded plastic waste ends up in our oceans. If current plastic consumption patterns persist, by 2050, the oceans will contain more plastic than fish by weight. And they’ll be living in one of the newest marine microbial habitats, the Plastisphere (not to be confused with the monstrous garbage patches).
Much of that plastic comes from the world’s rivers. In fact, the UN estimates that 1,000 rivers are accountable for nearly 80% of global annual riverine plastic emissions into the ocean. And more than 80% of the plastic waste that ends up in the ocean comes from Asia. That’s partly because China produces roughly 6.59 million metric tons of plastic every month, but it’s largely due to trash-exporting from the West to the East.
Once again, this is the product of fossil-fuel-based plastic, which is here to stay forever. With something organic that comes from and returns to the planet without causing harm, that can’t happen.
The Garbage Patches. Every year, 8 million tons of discarded plastic waste ends up in our oceans. If current plastic consumption patterns persist, by 2050, the oceans will contain more plastic than fish by weight.
Obstacles to Shifting to Hemp Bioplastic
Laws Against Cannabis
Worldwide, longstanding efforts to demonize and criminalize cannabis hindered what could otherwise have been at least one century of research and development. As a result, even with recent success toward legalizing cannabis, such as the federal government’s legalization of hemp in 2018, funding remains scant where it’s needed most to move forward with hemp bioplastic. Investors don’t want to get their hands dirty, and that’s still the general impression of any cannabis dealings – legally sanctioned or not.
The Plastic Constituency
Setting aside the relationship between oil and government at a global scale, consider something on superficially equal footing with cannabis: fellow bioplastic materials corn and soy. The international supply chain for petroleum is well established and even better protected. But both corn and soy are subsidized by the U.S. government. So, the politicians in and representing states with corn or soy as a substantial commodity are at an advantage, to say the least. A contest between a morally tarnished plant and a taxpayer-funded darling is no contest at all.
High Manufacturing Cost, High Product Price
Despite EuroPlas’ simplification of hemp bioplastic production as a DIY project, the fact remains that the economy-of-scale advantage has yet to befall cannabis-derived plastic. The production infrastructure isn’t in place, and hemp cultivation is still limited, so hemp bioplastic remains a luxury item. Because it costs more to produce hemp bioplastic at the only available (small) scale, compared to producing traditional plastic at a massive scale, the cost passed on to the consumer is higher. It has been speculated that people will pay up to 10% more for the ecofriendly version of something, but never more than that.
Cultural Resistance to Change
Much of the world is accustomed to single-use plastic and minimal reuse. And the long fatty acid chains needed to produce single-use plastic are readily found in petroleum-derived cellulose, but not in hemp cellulose. So, part of the change from traditional plastic to hemp bioplastic would be getting used to having to save up and compost all the little things we’re used to throwing away and never thinking about again.
Here’s an experiment for you to try. From the moment you wake up, keep track of how many things you consume that are accessed through or contain single-use plastic. Open a package of food, and that’s one. Use dental floss, and that’s another. Smoke a cigarette with plastic in the filter, and that’s another one. Change your maxi pad, and that’s another one. Remove the packaging from something you ordered, and that’s another one. On and on it goes. Pay close attention, and just count them. At the end of the day, look at the number of plastic things you used once and threw away with no intent to recycle them. That’s your single-use-plastic habit, more or less. And that would have to go away – entirely. Wow.
Much of the world is accustomed to single-use packaging and minimal reuse. Photo by Sgroey, CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons
So, you have to get people to put way more thought into their consumption-and-disposal habits, as no waste would be trivial anymore – no more throwing things away all day long. Good luck!
And you have to get people to be willing to pay 10%+ higher prices for things they could get at a fraction of the price in eco-unfriendly equivalents. Good luck!
And you have to get politicians to relinquish the barriers to entry for hemp by backing down on maintaining corn and soy’s political protection. Good luck!
A lot remains to be done in hearts and minds that will prove as challenging as establishing and maintaining infrastructure and further advancing bioplastic technology.
Conclusion
Whether realistic or foolishly utopian, the idea of replacing petroleum with cannabis for plastic production is worth learning about. Odds are, the change won’t come about from a guilty conscience or fear of microplastics (justified though that would be); desperation is usually required to make a mental U-turn of this magnitude.
But it’s still cool to know that there’s an alternative to obliterating the land we live on, poisoning the air we breathe, and ruining the habitat that constitutes 95% of our biosphere for the sake of convenience and thrift. We can still have convenience and thrift with hemp bioplastic – just not immediately. And modern life hinges upon instant gratification, so that’s tough to accept, naturally. Even so, the solution exists. Who knew?
Kathleen Hearons is a writer, editor, linguist and voice over actor from Los Angeles. She specializes in creative writing and research-intensive analysis and reporting.
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