Our plastics perform without fail when stored in common environments such as one’s home, garage, vehicle, or place of business, and when used within 1 year of purchase date.
Traditional plastic is an environmentally-destructive. At Pura Vida Bioplastics we provide an alternative, ecologically-efficient product. The plastic in a conventional materials are derived from oil or natural gas, i.e. through the use of a non-renewable resource. The materials that make up a Pura Vida Bioplastics products are from extrusion-grade bioplastic and a compound cereal flours and biodegradable polyesters.
Plastics glut landfills for centuries before they degrade, and their production does not support efficient and effective recycling of resources. Additionally, most plastics contain color additives and chemicals that further pollute the environment.
Our products are made from biobased material: the ingredients that go into making one of our plastics are naturally sourced, and can be produced again and again (through crop growing) without harming the environment.
Finally, biobased materials return to nature, sustaining the renewable material life cycle, rather than polluting the environment with plastic byproducts.
80° F is the suggested temperature for long-term storage of the plastics. In general, our plastics can withstand a temperature of up to 150° Fahrenheit.
First and foremost, our plastics do not retain any of the harmful, unsustainable properties of traditional plastics. They come from biobased renewable resources that are grown, rather than processed.
The base ingredient of our product is maize, which is a non-GMO cereal flour that, during its life cycle, consumes harmful CO2 while producing oxygen for the environment.
In contrast, the polyethylene that goes into traditional plastic straws is manufactured, producing harmful greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.
Additionally, our plastics are thoroughly compostable. Our product can break down into organically viable compounds within a time period equal to the duration that an organic compound (such as food waste) would take to break down in the same environment.
Composting reduces the amount of waste that gets directed to landfills. Through composting, the organic matter is transformed into a useful fertilizer, thus returning nutrients to the nutrient cycle. As a result, fewer raw materials are added to the production/nutrient cycle cutting down the energy consumption that is associated with current climate change.
The answer is both yes and no. The proprietary material that makes up our plastics is biodegradable; it is plant-based and produces non-toxic byproducts, such as humus (the organic compound of soil).
Nevertheless, we respect and adhere to the FTC Green Guide regulations and the California environmental marketing guidelines which state that claims of 100% degradation or biodegradation are difficult to prove.
Therefore, to adhere to California’s Green Guidelines, we are not claiming or marketing our plastics as ‘biodegradable’ or ‘degradable’.
Consumers should be wary of any product that claims to be 100% degradable or 100% biodegradable, because, in short, the current infrastructure of our communities (e.g. landfills, municipal dumps) does not promote/aide complete biodegradation.
If our plastics end up in a landfill, they can degrade in the anaerobic (sealed landfill) conditions of traditional landfills. Because our plastics are made from biobased renewable resources, they degrade at the same rate as other natural/organic compounds found in the landfill, such as paper, yard waste, or food. Yet, even in this less-than-optimal setting, our products have an environmental value that only a bioplastic product like ours can provide.
For more information on this subject please visit our Government Regulations page, which has links to the laws we site and adhere to.
Pura Vida Bioplastics are made from a new generation of material called a bioplastic.
Our bioplastic compound is created from non-GMO cereal flour (maize) and biodegradable polymers. With it we can substitute fossil fuels (and their byproducts), increasing resource efficiency.
More specifically, our product falls under the sub-heading of compostable plastics: Called biobased/compostable polymers, these formulations are made from biomass/plant feed stocks (in our case cereal flour) and are designed to break down in a controlled environment (composting) into a nutrient-rich humus, which can be used as natural fertilizer and to replenish depleted soil. Composting reduces the amount of waste that gets directed to landfills. Because our plastics are made from biobased renewable resources, they degrade at the same rate as other natural/organic compounds found in the landfill, such as paper, yard waste, or food.