Plastic-munching mussels and mushrooms: Waitrose supermarket funds innovative environmental projects

06 Apr 2021 --- Waitrose is celebrating the achievements of pioneering environmental organizations funded through its Plan Plastic – The Million Pound Challenge project, which has been raising money through a 5p charge on plastic bag sales over the past two years. 

Launched in 2019, the project was used to provide grants ranging from £150,000 (US$208,000) to £300,000 (US$415,000).

Environmental charity Hubbub worked with the supermarket to support five chosen projects and measure their work’s impact. 

A Hubbub spokesperson tells PackagingInsights about the charity’s collaboration with Waitrose. “Hubbub’s involvement in the Plan Plastic campaign was to manage the fund, which Waitrose created through the sale of 5p (US$0.07) carrier bags.” 

“Hubbub is experienced in delivering effective environmental campaigns, with long-lasting results.”

“By drawing on their expertise, they were able to identify which of the 150 applicants had projects with the potential to deliver significant long-term impact to reduce plastic pollution.”

An expert panel made up of representatives from academia, industry, NGOs and business chose the winners. They were selected from 150 projects that applied for funding, from which eight were selected to present to the panel before a final five organizations were awarded grants. 

Muscling out microplastics
One of the key packaging-based grant winners was Mussel Power, a creation by Plymouth Marine Laboratory (PML). The project demonstrated mussels’ potential to help stem the flow of microplastics from polluted estuaries and coastal water.

Community Biorecycling are using mycelium to break down plastic.Mussel Power identified that a cluster of 300 mussels (5 kg) could filter out over 250,000 microplastics per hour. It also showed that mussels eject the microplastics within fecal pellets that sink irrespective of their plastic content. 

PML used computer modeling to identify mussels sited near the mouths of rivers and estuaries could filter between 20 to 25 percent of small, waterborne microplastics. The research will continue with the aim of finding similar ecological solutions to plastic pollution. 

Plastic-eating mushrooms
Another packaging based winner is Community Biorecycling, which created a bio-recycling facility to carry out research into mycelium (the root structure of mushrooms) to break down and digest plastic. 

The project developed four strains of mycelium and “trained them” to digest plastic at an accelerated rate. It also set up a community-led bio-recycling facility in Watchet, UK, named “Biomill Watchet.”

The project revealed an “unexpected outcome”: developing a leather-like mycelium mass that absorbs and consumes plastic particles. 

Biohm will research this further to explore mycelium’s ability to absorb and consume micro- or nano-plastics in water purification infrastructure and processes. 

Other grant winners
Three other grant winners were also chosen: 

• Environmentstrual – Wen (Women’s Environmental Network) and City to Sea delivered education to thousands of students, including the training of 724 teachers and nurses to deliver workshops exploring menstruation’s social and environmental issues. 
• Safegear – Blue Marine Foundation developed a cost-effective beacon for fishermen to prevent fishing gear becoming plastic pollution in the marine environment. 
• Message In A Bottle – Youth Hostels Association eliminated the need for half a million single-use plastic bottles per year by providing publicly accessible water fountains for reusable bottle refills.

Saskia Restorick, director at Hubbub, says: “The response to the Waitrose Plan Plastic fund was overwhelming. It is so encouraging to see how many people are trying to make a real difference to reducing plastic pollution in the UK.” 

“It has been incredible to watch the five chosen projects develop over the past year, and we truly believe the impact they can have is instrumental in tackling plastic pollution. Each project has a long-term legacy beyond the grant fund, and it has been a privilege to have been a part of the start of that journey.”

Waitrose fighting pollution
The project achievements come as part of a series of commitments made by Waitrose to drive increased environmental sustainability in its packaging. 

Waitrose raised funds through 5p charges on plastic bags.The supermarket aims to reduce the amount of own-brand packaging, including plastics, by a third by 2023. It is also working to remove 20 percent of plastic from its own-brand ranges by the end of 2021 while ensuring branded and own-brand packaging contains at least 30 percent recycled content in the same time frame. It will also ban non-recyclable plastic from all branded and own-brand packaging by 2021. 

Waitrose UK recently announced it is replacing coffee capsules with a home-compostable alternative, saving millions of capsules from landfill. The previous capsules were made from mixed materials (polypropylene with an aluminum lid), difficult to separate for recycling.

Waitrose will now sell coffee capsules made from bio-sourced materials, including sunflower seed bark and sugars derived from corn, which are fully compostable. The lid is made from cellulose and can also be home-composted. The box is fully recyclable.

In spite of these targets, a recent Greenpeace report found that Waitrose is leading the UK supermarket plastic reduction race but is falling short on the recycled content front.

The plastic bag charge
The UK government announced plans to extend the single-use carrier bag charge to all retailers and increase the levy to 10p from this month. The latest government statistics show the current levy, which stands at 5p and applies to any retailer employing 250 or more people, has led to a 95 percent cut in plastic bag sales in major supermarkets since 2015. 

The levy extension, which marks the latest move to clamp down on plastic pollution, is designed to scale up the success and bring the country closer to eliminating avoidable plastic waste through its 25 Year Environment Plan, and build a greener post-COVID-19 society.

By Louis Gore-Langton