Plastics Unwrapped is a podcast series by Dow, featuring a range of expert guests exploring some of the biggest questions facing the plastics industry right now. Across several bite-sized episodes, we open up the conversation and explore the world of sustainability and plastics.
A sustainable future requires the creation of a circular economy for plastic, and we must build systems with decarbonisation at the core.
In Episode #4 of Plastics Unwrapped, we explored how advanced recycling technologies will play a key role in accelerating a circular economy for plastic. In this episode, we take it a step further and address how this process can help us decarbonise operations. We sat down with Oliver Borek from Mura, a world leader in advanced recycling technology, Virginia Janssens, the Managing Director for Plastics Europe, and Marc van den Biggelaar, Sustainability Director at Dow, to discuss what’s needed to create a circular economy for plastics, how we're scaling advanced recycling, and considerations for how the industry can reach net zero.
While the industry agrees that there’s a need to decarbonize plastics, is a comparison to coal fair? In this episode, Dow’s Carolina Gregorio is in discussion with David Carroll of Plastics Europe and David Croft of Racket as they explore the journey the plastics industry needs to take to reach net zero emissions, and how the smallest of shifts in consumer behaviour can drastically decrease the amount of virgin plastics needed to make packaging.
Key discussion points:
This episode explores the challenges faced by Africa’s informal waste sector, with a focus on the partnerships helping to improve the continent’s plastics value chain to enable the scaling of advanced recycling solutions. Adwoa Coleman is joined by Vivien Luk, Executive Director of non-profit organization WORK, and Cordie Aziz-Nash, founder of Environment 360, for this thought-provoking discussion. The panel touch on the effects of COVID-19 on plastics processing chains in Africa and describe the changes needed to transform the continent’s informal waste sector.
Key discussion points:
This episode explores the role of design in enabling a circular economy for plastics, by delving into the challenges and opportunities of scaling designing for recycling solutions. Julie Zaniewski is joined in this conversation by Jay Fitzgerald from the US Department of Energy and Kathleen Liang from North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University. The panel discusses the role of individual businesses in advancing plastics recycling and set out their own company goals, including objectives for improving waste management, reducing greenhouse gases, and increasing the recyclability of products.
Key discussion points:
This episode delves into the need to reduce CO2 emissions in the plastics industry and how Dow is working towards producing circular plastics with a lower CO2 footprint. Marco Ten Bruggencate is joined by Howard Chase and Erika Sánchez Garrido, from Dow, and Kaj Embren, a sustainable development expert. They discuss why the decade between 2020 to 2030 is crucial in terms climate protection and how ‘The Greta effect’ has caused public consciousness around CO2 levels to grow, sparking a rise in demand for industry action.
Key discussion points include:
In this episode, Carsten Larsen, Dow’s Commercial Director for Recycling in EMEA & APAC is joined by Iain Gulland, CEO of Zero Waste Scotland, and Sirt Mellema, CEO of Fuenix Ecogy Group, to discuss ‘game-changing’ advanced recycling technology.
Advanced recycling takes hard-to-recycle, mixed plastic waste and breaks it down into its basic chemical elements – allowing waste to become infinitely recyclable. The panel look at what this technology means for both industry and consumers.
Key discussion points include:
Why is it so difficult to recycle plastics? What is the difference between recyclable and recycled? Why do recycling rates change so drastically from country to country and even street to street? Dow's Romain Cazenave, Marketing Director for Packaging & Specialty Plastics in EMEA, and Karin Katzer, Marketing Director in EMEA, shed light on this topic and explain how plastic manufacturers can create products that are easier to recycle as well as support recycling systems. They are joined by Krzysztof Krajewski, Director of Packaging Sustainability at RB, one of the world’s largest consumer goods companies.
Key discussion points include:
Dow's Thomas Reutter, Product Director for Packaging & Specialty Plastics in EMEA, and Panu Routasalo, Vice President at UPM Biofuels, talk about market growth for renewable feedstocks and how this fits with the industry’s plans to reduce its carbon emissions. They discuss why approaches like mass balance are important in supporting market growth for bioplastics, as well as the industry's role in ensuring the growth of renewable feedstocks and the need to continue working together with others to find more sustainable solutions.
Key discussion points include:
Amanda is a wife. A mother. A blogger. A Christian.
A charming, beautiful, bubbly, young woman who lives life to the fullest.
But Amanda is dying, with a secret she doesn’t want anyone to know.
She starts a blog detailing her cancer journey, and becomes an inspiration, touching and
captivating her local community as well as followers all over the world.
Until one day investigative producer Nancy gets an anonymous tip telling her to look at Amanda’s
blog, setting Nancy on an unimaginable road to uncover Amanda’s secret.
Award winning journalist Charlie Webster explores this unbelievable and bizarre, but
all-too-real tale, of a woman from San Jose, California whose secret ripped a family apart and
left a community in shock.
Scamanda is the true story of a woman whose own words held the key to her secret.
New episodes every Monday.
Follow Scamanda on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen.
Amanda’s blog posts are read by actor Kendall Horn.