The Distance Project

I hate packaging.

Posted on May 8th, 2007 by Zach.
Categories: Sustainability, Systems of the World.

Can I be any clearer than that? Let me try: I hate Blister Packaging with a fiery passion that knows no bounds. You know this stuff - every electronic gizmo comes in it. It’s a clear plastic shell that is totally impenetrable, the Fort Knox of packaging. If you were stuck on a deserted island with no tools and had to get it open to eat, you would either starve to death, or else die accidentally slicing an artery on the razor like edges.

I mean is there anything quite so stupid? It is such a nightmare, people are developing special tools to open this kind of packaging. Check out this one.

Pretty smart, but according to an article I read, the tool comes in Blister Pack. Great. Still dying on the island.

Vendors love this stuff I guess, and factories make the packaging process easy (plus there is no currently viable alternative, so the point is moot). If I order a pallet of items from overseas, not only do I get my product all packaged up coming out of the factory, but they will put my branding and instructions in the thing so I don’t have to do any assembly afterwards. You would not believe what a hassle reduction that is for a company. And reduced hassle is my dream come true these days.

Blister packing protects the products from damage really well too. Plastic really can get fairly beaten up and still look decent on an in-store display.

You want to experience waste? In my life it is when stores send back product because the PACKAGING is damaged. I love this, it always makes my day - the product is fine, it is just the protective shell that is beaten up. What? But this is not a knock on the stores. People don’t buy things with beaten up packaging. They just don’t. This may sound like stupid reasoning, but I have recently learned a lot about how people buy in stores (myself included) and presentation means a whole lot, it may be the only thing that matters in many cases.

It is hard to steal anything that is contained in Blister Packaging and that is a plus, but this is mainly due to the fact that there is so much plastic around the product. As an example, I recently bought a set of earbud headphones. There was at least double the amount of plastic in the packaging than in the product itself.

These aren’t the ones exactly, but you get the idea.

Douglas Adams once announced that a society which had instructions on toothpicks was broken. Me? I think when the material in packaging exceeds the product, we are all in big trouble.

What is truly excellent is that our plastic trash will be here a while. This stuff sits around for the odd 3-6 thousand years. It is typically a low grade plastic too which cannot be recycled. Instead we throw it away about 12 seconds after tearing into it as consumers. Broken System Alert.

The worst part of the whole thing is that plastic is made of petroleum. In an age where oil is getting more and more valuable, it is insane that we use so much in such useless situations. Thinking about the Oil economy takes up way too much of my time these days, but at least it is usually based around situations where Oil is being used because there are no other systemic options. This is true in packaging of course, there are no other great options, but it seems like this is a fairly easy systemic fix. Proof yet again that if I was a billionaire it would be fun to start the next generation plastics lab. There is no reason packaging has to stay around the way it does. And maybe we could save the oil for, you know, driving firetrucks around or something?

Next up in the Packaging Vent-A-Thon: Cardboard….

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The Breaking - More Martha Stewart or Road Warrior?

Posted on March 30th, 2007 by Zach.
Categories: Systems of the World, Industry.

We are beholden to tentative social systems like never before in human history.

Usually when that idea pops into my head, I am freaking out about the coming Oil crisis. Oil dictates so incredibly much of my world, it is crazy. The success of Reware for example is utterly and completely dictated by fossil based fuels. We build Solar Bags in which, let’s say for argument sake, 80-90%% of our process is dependent on Oil – The photovoltaics include materials refined using fossil based energy, they are then sealed in a special plastic coating (all plastics are petroleum based), they are then shipped (Using diesel fired trucks, trains, and planes) to a factory whose machines, heat, lights, and arriving workers are all powered by fossil energy. They cut rolls of various Nylon Fabrics (and if you own nylon, you own a nice little piece of woven oil my friend) into bags that incorporate the solar. Bags are then shipped to a warehouse, and then shipped to your doorstep. Let’s see, is there any step that isn’t totally dependent on the oil economy for us? Nope.

Think Oil price fluctuations matter?
And we are not special, you can take apart any industry and see the exact thing.

The systemic use of Oil in the world is astounding and we have two brand spanking new industrial behemoths developing in India and China. There is no question that there will be some shortage in availability will effect the cost of doing business AT EVERY SINGLE STEP for us, and the US economy at large.

Not convinced? Talk to Matt Simmons – a former Bush energy advisor - about what he thinks about the Oil that exists in the oilfields of the Middle East, or what he anticipates the growing demand to do to our own national security. Or how about James Woolsey, former CIA head under Clinton. Or Amory Lovins, who has forgotten more about this issue than I will ever know.

All of them will tell you that the coming Oil shock is a big deal. Interestingly though, it is not the only system we hang onto by a thread. There are other examples; among others Food Distribution, Clean Water Access, hell Traffic Volume - are all systems that stand precarious if you start to analyze them.

Imagine for a second all communications stopped on the planet. It is not that hard to spin a scenario where all satellite communications were knocked out, and not just from a rogue missile system Take this story about a coming solar storm.

Oh yeah, you read that right, Solar Storms! As if we didn’t have enough to worry about right? But I don’t bring this up in a doomsday mood – we’ll leave the killer asteroid we should worry about for another time. No, it looks like this storm won’t disrupt much, but it served as a mechanism to think about how critically important global communications are to the world we live in, and are only getting more so.

The question I find myself asking is what would be the impact of this. Seriously this is what I am wondering – what happens when the systems of the world come to a grinding halt? The easy answer is that I need to start buying leather chaps and spiked collars for my posse of punked out 80’s style post-apocalyptic warriors. We could drive around in dune buggies looking for trouble.

As exciting as that vision is, it seems like there might be a more nuanced answer. Will it be Road Warrior, or Martha Stewart, this world where systems break down. Is there good in system breakage? A rise in local economies, a subsistence workday, a return to natural fibers and a lessening of mass produced goods anyone? Any takers?

I don’t have all the answers, but I am curious. I can’t help but think that with all the doomsday projections, there are some serious unrealized positives. And I don’t call me a Luddite, I am just spinning the question. The Amish live a decent lifestyle, with happiness, family, and healthy economy. Is it unreasonable to look at that and wonder what would become of us should the systems we rely on so heavily disappear?

My current lifestyle personally would come to a grinding halt, especially workwise. I count myself as pretty handy, but the reality is I like the creature comforts of our systems. I don’t want to work in the fields dawn til dusk. I am a product of the digital age. I don’t remember what it was like before email – partly because it has become so ingrained in the business and personal world, and partly because I never worked in the pre-digital age. I have some vague recollection about how you do research without the internet, but sourcing materials for Juice Bags?

Now how would I go about that exactly? No really.

Update 4.5.07: It appears the Solar Storm will screw up systems. GPS and general global navigation may feel the heat. Sorry about the pun.

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