![]() ![]() ![]() Like other plastics, polystyrene can be heated and molded, shaped, or extruded into a variety of different shapes and sizes. In fact, if you look at a piece of polystyrene foam, you may actually be able to see these beads. Using heat and steam, these beads are softened and expanded, eventually growing larger and, as a result, less dense. It is made from hydrocarbons like benzene and ethylene, which require raw materials like natural gas and petroleum.Īt the beginning of the manufacturing process, polystyrene starts as small, dense, hard beads. Like other plastics, polystyrene is a polymer a long repeating chain of monomers (small molecules). However, the material has sparked controversy in recent years for good reason. It has proven to be very useful, but unfortunately, its use comes with complications for our planet and our health. What is something that helps to keep coffee hot and shipped materials safe? Polystyrene foam. Some food and beverage companies, they said, want containers made from more recycled and compostable material, but not everyone is willing to accept the additional costs.Why are Foam Cups Bad for the Environment? But there are no facilities in the city that can compost material commercially, so the trays are sent to landfills or an incinerator, according to a spokeswoman for the city school system.ĭart executives say many of their customers also want more sustainable containers, but are facing the financial realities. The Baltimore schools now serve lunch on compostable trays. “As soon as they lost, it was like they took their marbles and went home,” said Martha Ainsworth, a volunteer leader with the Sierra Club in Maryland.Įven with the foam ban, Baltimore faces challenges in achieving its sustainability goals. Wayner and others, the move showed that Dart considered polystyrene recycling not a viable enterprise but rather a bargaining chip to ward off regulation. Dart in the 1950s and refined over decades, is such a closely guarded secret that only select employees and customers are allowed on the factory floor.Īsked about the closing, the Dart spokeswoman Becky Warren said in a statement, “We invest our recycling resources in communities that support our customers and our company.” The company says the foam machinery, designed by Mr. The one area that was off limits was Building No. It is a shrine to the throwaway items of everyday life: blue coffee cups with the Greek-style design and tiny clear plastic cups found in dentists’ offices. Another shows coffee lids through the years. One display charts the history of the clam shell container. He proudly walked a reporter through a small museum in the lobby where single-use plastic products are arrayed like fine art. Lammers shuttles around Dart’s sprawling corporate campus in Mason in a blue Honda Accord. Lammers, who joined the company in 1986.Ī lawyer by training, Mr. “Food and beverage packaging, like a lot of things in life, is not a sound-bite discussion,” said Mr. Lammers said the company was growing frustrated with the intensifying blowback against foam. Some elected officials and environmental groups say polystyrene containers are difficult to recycle in any meaningful way. (Styrofoam is a trademarked material typically used as insulation.) Maine and Maryland banned polystyrene foam containers last year, and nearly 60 nations have enacted or are in the process of passing similar prohibitions. ![]() Cuomo of New York proposed a statewide ban on single-use food containers made of “expanded polystyrene” foam, more commonly, but inaccurately, known as Styrofoam. It employs about 15,000 people across 14 states.īut now many of the products that this low-profile Midwestern company creates are being labeled by critics as environmental blights contributing to the world’s plastic pollution problem.Ĭities and states are increasingly banning one of Dart’s signature products, foam food and beverage containers, which can harm fish and other marine life. Dart makes, by the millions, white foam cups, clamshells, coffee cup lids, and disposable forks and knives - the single-use containers that enable Americans to eat and drink on the go. The family-owned business was co-founded in Michigan by a World War II veteran with a triple major in mathematics, engineering and metallurgy, and it developed products that, in no small way, helped fuel the modern economy. The Dart Container Corporation, by some measures, is an American success story.
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