German biotech startup Insempra has closed a $20M Series A funding round to expand the production of its yeast-fermented lipids for food and cosmetics.

Led by EQT Ventures, the Series A round builds on Insempra’s 2021 seed funding to bring its total raised to over $35M. Other participants included returning investors BlueYard Capital, Possible Ventures, Taavet Sten and Acequia Capital, and new investors such as Henkel dx Ventures, Bayern Kapital and Alante Capital.

The German startup plans to use the capital to scale up its technology, scouting, development and manufacturing capabilities, with the goal of turning oil yeast into lipids on an industrial scale using precision fermentation.

“New technology platforms such as Insempra’s have the potential to dramatically change the manufacturing processes of multiple multibillion-dollar industries, developing customised ingredients to fit market needs,” said Ted Persson partner at EQT Ventures.

Bio-based alternatives to petrochemicals

Founded in 2020 by Andreas Heyl and Jens Klein, Insempra leverages new technologies to make bio-based alternatives to problematic ingredients and products for multiple applications and industries. Many companies currently rely on oils and materials sourced from petrochemicals, which have a harmful effect on the planet and deplete our already limited natural resources.

With heavy environmental impacts, growing consumer demand and a rise in regulatory restrictions, the ingredient world is changing, and sectors like beauty, personal care, food, nutrition and fashion are under pressure to switch to sustainable alternatives. Insemora suggests its advanced tech platform results in superior natural ingredients produced on an industrial scale to help manufacturers make the shift.

The company is growing lipids for food and cosmetic applications, while also developing technology to offer a bio-based alternative to everyday materials like polymers and textiles. It is also producing fibres for the fashion industry via Salina, its London-based spinoff with Imperial College, and plans to create new natural molecules for use in functional ingredient applications like antioxidants, preservatives, flavours and fragrances.

“Insempra has both the team and the technology to drive a revolution in industrial manufacturing and gain rapid market traction for its products,” said Persson.

Using oil yeasts to produce lipids

Lipids are compounds that come in the form of fats and oils that are ever-present in beauty, fashion and food product formulations. But currently, they mostly come from petrochemicals. “Lipids typically are either extracted from nature – you harvest the plant – or you can produce them petrochemical,” Klein, who is Insempra’s CEO, told TechCrunch.

Some startups are coming up with new processes to produce lipids from organic, bio-based materials. “We use so-called oil yeast,” said Klein. “And these oil yeasts are put under certain conditions in our steel vessels under certain metabolic situations. Then they produce lipid oils, which we can extract later on, and which we can sell into the cosmetics and into the food industry.”

There are a host of companies producing lipids from sustainable ingredients. In the food industry itself, Australia’s Nourish Ingredients and California’s Yali Bio also use precision fermentation to produce fats and lipids, while Germany’s Planet A Foods (maker of cocoa-free chocolate ChoViva) is focusing on plant-based lipids. Swiss startup Cultivated Biosciences, meanwhile, similarly leverages yeast fermentation to produce lipids as part of its alternative dairy fat.

But Klein – a former CEO of a vegan silk polymer company – believes Insempra’s chief competitors are specialty ingredient companies, particularly the petrochemical industry. “I don’t know any other company with an approach like ours,” he said.

Last year, the company announced the successful testing of second-generation feedstocks to commercially manufacture fermentation-based products alongside plant-based materials specialist Fibers365. And, in March, it was part of a consortium of companies that won €2.1M in a Eurostars grant.

“Working in collaboration with nature, we will continue to expand our capacity to develop intrinsically sustainable materials that are superior in quality and will reduce our dependence on chemical industrialisation processes,” said Klein.

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Unilever-owned mayonnaise brand Hellmann’s Canada has partnered with Italian sustainable fashion label ID.Eight to launch a limited-edition collection of sneakers made from food waste.

Mushrooms, corn, apples and grapes – these may be part of your next meal, but they also might be in your next shoe. That’s the idea behind the new sneakers unveiled by Hellmann’s in partnership with ID.Eight, which are part of the mayonnaise giant’s ongoing food waste awareness campaign.

The 1352: Refreshed Sneakers take their name from a disturbing statistic – it’s a reference to the amount of money ($1,352) Canadian households spend on food that goes to waste each year. The campaign is meant to highlight the impact of food waste in Canada, and promote conscious consumption amid the cost-of-living crisis.

“With 1352: Refreshed Sneakers we’ve created a visual representation of Canadians’ food waste, aimed at sparking conversation and challenging consumers to take small steps to reducing that $1,352 amount of food that’s wasted each year,” said Hellmann’s Canada senior brand manager Harsh Pant.

New sneakers part of Hellmann’s food waste campaign

With their yellow, white and blue hues, the new running shoes are reminiscent of Hellmann’s mayonnaise bottles. They were designed by ID.Eight, a Florentine brand known for making vegan, eco-friendly sneakers using food waste from produce like apples, corn and grapes. The sneakers are made up of materials derived from each of these ingredients, alongside waste from mycelium and sugarcane.

“Hellmann’s commitment to using local ingredients and their mission of reducing food waste complements ID.Eight’s commitment to using sustainable and quality materials, making them a natural partner for us,” said ID.Eight co-founder and brand manager Giuliana Borzillo.

One study suggests that 58% of all food is wasted or lost in Canada, but 32% of it could be redirected to support its communities – nearly seven million Canadians (over a sixth of its population) suffer from food insecurity. This also translates to 56.5 million tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions, and nearly $50B in economic losses.

Tackling food waste should be an environmental and social priority, as pointed out by the UNEP. “Hellmann’s has a longstanding history of taking the necessary steps to address, raise awareness, and reduce food waste,” said Pant. The 1352: Refreshed Sneakers are part of its Make Taste, Not Waste campaign, which was launched in 2018 to fight this issue.

This has involved the four-week-long Fridge Night challenge, dedicated Super Bowl ads for the last four years, a partnership with Ogilvy for use-what-you’ve-got recipes, a Smart Jar that revealed hidden messages when placed in fridges at 5°C or lower, and a Meal Reveal tool to provide recipe ideas from what people have in their fridges.

Canadians can enter a draw to win a pair of the limited-edition sneakers, and each entry will see Hellmann’s donate the equivalent of 10 meals to food waste charity Second Harvest. An accompanying website page hosts leftover recipes using the ingredients found in the shoes. The brand has also committed to providing a C$25,000 ($18,300) donation, which it says would provide enough healthy food for 75,000 meals in Canada.

Unilever walks back on climate pledges

While Hellmann’s has certainly made some strides in raising food awareness around food waste and sustainability, its parent company, Unilever, has been in the crosshairs of environmentalists lately.

Long seen as an environmental, social and corporate governance (ESG) leader, the CPG giant last week announced that it was abandoning or watering down some of its climate and social goals, in the wake of increased pressure from shareholders to focus on financials first.

Unilever has a net-zero commitment for 2039, with its scope 3 emissions the main area needing attention (they make up 98% of its footprint). A month ago, it had announced its target to reduce absolute scope 3 emissions, cutting energy and industrial emissions by 42%, and forest, land and agriculture by 30% come 2030 (from a 2021 baseline).

However, CEO Hein Schumacher told Bloomberg that the company has now updated some of its ESG goals. This included delaying a goal to make 100% of its plastic packaging reusable, recyclable or compostable, changing its target to halve virgin plastic use by 2025 to reduce it by only one-third by 2026, lowering its goal to source 100% of its key crops sustainably to 95%, and slashing its promise to protect 1.5 million hectares of land and oceans to a million hectares instead.

Unilever’s commitment to pay all direct suppliers a living wage by 2030 now just covers half of the suppliers making up its procurement spending by 2026. The business has also dropped several pledges, including a commitment to spend €2B per year on diverse businesses globally, having 5% of its workforce be comprised of people with disabilities by 2025, and making all its ingredients biodegradable by the end of the decade.

And while Hellmann’s is asking people to waste less food, Unilever itself has abandoned its goal of cutting food waste in its operations by 50% by 2025.

Similarly, Unilever’s intention to roll out carbon labels on the packaging of all 75,000 of its products by 2026 seems to be at a standstill. “It is possible that some of our brands may wish to communicate product carbon footprints in the future, and for this having accurate data is essential,” a company representative told Green Queen last week.

“We also know information must be provided in context to be meaningful to consumers,” they added, outlining that the business was “committed to improving transparency of GHG emissions” in its value chain. “Our collection of more accurate data will help Unilever to make more informed procurement decisions as we work towards our climate targets.”

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Apple has stopped production of FineWoven, its eco-friendly alternative to leather for iPhone and Apple Watch cases, after complaints about its performance and durability.

“Goodbye Leather.” This was Apple’s message in a short new ad released last week. The tech giant was promoting its move to ditch the material from its entire product line.

But there was one glaring omission. The ad made no mention of FineWoven, Apple’s first innovation designed to replace leather. You’d think a commercial about scrapping leather would promote an alternative material the company was actively selling.

That’s the thing, though: it doesn’t feel like it’ll be selling it much longer, with the Cupertino-based firm reportedly halting production of FineWoven cases for its phones, watches and accessories, after months of incriminating reviews from dissatisfied customers.

Cardboard-like material with ‘insulting’ price

The tech leader had announced the FineWoven cases at its September event (headlined by the iPhone 15 launch), as part of its efforts to become carbon-neutral by 2030. “Leather is a popular material for accessories, but it has a significant carbon footprint, especially at Apple scale,” Lisa Jackson, Apple’s VP of environment, policy and social initiatives, said at the virtual event. “To reduce our impact, we will no longer use leather in any new Apple products, including watchbands.”

FineWoven was described as a microtwill fabric with a suede-like texture and “significantly lower emissions” than leather. It was made from 68% post-consumer recycled content, though it isn’t clear how much of that was bio-based, and if there’s any plastic involved.

The move signposted Apple’s strategy for the post-leather landscape, with the company hoping to meet its climate goals alongside some financial gains. But on Sunday, Twitter/X user and known Apple leaker Kosutami posted an update on the new eco-friendly material. “FineWoven is gone. Since its durability were bad [sic],” they wrote.

“All the production line was stopped and removed. Apple would move to another material – again, not the leather,” they continued.

For context, Kosutami had unveiled Apple’s plans to introduce the woven fabric on new Apple Watch bands weeks before they were announced, while they also leaked the first images of FineWoven accessories ahead of the event. Given the account’s previous credibility on this topic, it’s thought that this news is accurate as well.

And for many, it does not come as a surprise. Right from the get-go, the FineWoven cases were panned for their seemingly poor quality. Many questioned the premium price point (they cost $59 for iPhone cases and $99 for Apple Watch bands) for a product that felt much more run-of-the-mill than leather.

One customer compared it to cardboard and another likened it to “a polyester pillowcase sandwiched in a plastic shell”, calling the $59 price “insulting”. FineWoven products reportedly have high return rates, with complaints over dust retention, permanent scratches, the slippery texture, and a general lack of durability.

Apple’s FineWoven represents a missed opportunity

One of the most damning indictments came from The Verge writer and tech reviewer Allison Johnson, who labelled the FineWoven cases “really bad”. “Apple did a decent thing by discontinuing the leather cases, but FineWoven is just not the premium replacement we were looking for,” she wrote, describing how she was seeing signs of wear and bits of lint on newly unboxed cases.

“And then there’s the fingernail test,” she continued. “If I’m putting one of these cases on my phone, I’m inevitably going to scratch it on accident with a jagged fingernail edge, or it’s going to come into contact with my car keys. And when you scratch FineWoven, the results are seemingly permanent.”

The review criticised the high markup of the product, which has turned out to be the camel that broke the straw’s back. Studies show that consumers are willing to pay more for environmentally friendly products – especially Gen Z, nearly half of whom would shell out more for something greener. That’s great for Apple, considering its hold on this demographic (87% of American Gen Zers have an iPhone).

But if a sustainable product doesn’t give people the same feel and satisfaction they’re used to, it’s not going to work. People already think eco-friendly products cost too much and, traditionally, they can be perceived as inferior, whether that’s in terms of quality or appearance. As ideas go, FineWoven was a fine one, but the execution has been a sizeable (and loud) misstep, which won’t bode well for how the alternative leather industry is perceived.

Producing leather, which is derived from animal hide, takes up a lot of energy and water, is linked to deforestation and biodiversity loss, and produces health-harming chemicals during tanning. It also has a much higher carbon footprint at 110kg of CO2e per sq m, compared to synthetic and plant-based alternatives.

So any efforts to remove leather from the consumer cycle are a good thing for the planet. But they need to satisfy people with their quality, especially if they carry a premium markup. While Apple’s FineWoven stock runs out (if the rumours are indeed true), it’ll be interesting to see where it goes next. Is there a new, better FineWoven 2.0? Will the company partner with one of the many market-proven startups making vegan leather? Or is this all just a ruse and FineWoven is – in Apple’s opinion – just fine?

And what of its collaboration with Hermès, which was to make four new Apple Watch bands with climate-friendly materials? A lot of questions remain, but we’re likely to be kept in the dark until September, when the company refreshes its lineup with iPhone 16 and the Apple Watch Series 10.

The post After Ditching Leather, Apple Nixes Vegan FineWoven Alternative Too – It’s A Big Miss appeared first on Green Queen.

Swedish packaging solutions startup Saveggy has raised SEK 20M (€1.76M) to scale up its plastic-free, plant-based coating for fruits and vegetables, starting with cucumbers.

Lund-based Saveggy’s latest funding round of €1.76M was led by Unconventional Ventures, with additional participation from LRF Ventures, Almi Invest GreenTech, and angel investors.

With the twin goal of reducing plastic pollution and food waste, Saveggy will use the funds to produce its edible plant-based coating for fruits and vegetables at an industrial scale. Its first product is called SaveCucumber, which features a thin, invisible layer made from oats and rapeseed oil.

“We believe that freshness, the health of our planet, and the well-being of people should always remain uncompromised,” said co-founder and CEO Arash Fayyazi. “With this financing round, we will launch at industrial scale our first product.”

The pedigree of Fayyazi and his co-founder Vahid Sohrabpour (who is the chief innovation officer) was a major attraction for its lead investor, with Unconventional Ventures general partner Thea Messel saying: “Our investment in Saveggy was driven by the impressive credentials and substantial expertise of its founders. Their innovative technology tackles the significant challenges our food systems face.”

Killing two birds with one coat

Fayyazi and Sohrabpour launched Saveggy in 2020, describing it as a modular, customisable protection technology that can meet the requirements of different fruits and vegetables. According to the UN FAO, 45% of the world’s fruits and vegetables end up going to waste. Globally, we bin a billion household meals every single day, despite 780 million people (just under 10% of the population) facing hunger.

According to the UNEP, food waste contributes to 8-10% of global emissions. Making significant reductions in the amount of food we throw away is crucial to achieving climate and sustainable development goals relating to global heating, food security and biodiversity protection.

Meanwhile, plastic pollution – which relies on petroleum-based products – contributes to 3% of all greenhouse gas emissions (which is higher than the emissions impact of the aviation industry). Single-use plastics like those used in food packaging are devastating to the planet, especially marine life and aquatic systems, which end up back in our food system and present health threats to humans as well.

Plastic packaging is a massive problem for the food industry’s emissions (which account for a third of all emissions). In the US, for example, 63% of all municipal solid waste generated in 2014 comprised packaging materials for food and other purposes – only 35% was recycled or composted. But plastics offer a few key advantages for companies: they’re cheap to produce, they prevent water loss, they keep bacteria out, and they prolong the shelf life of produce.

Clearly, though, better solutions are needed. Saveggy’s offering isn’t a like-for-like substitute for plastic – it’s an altogether packaging-free alternative. It will benefit fruits or vegetables that have edible peels, adding a thin layer of its zero-additive plant-based coating that preserves freshness and shelf life.

Cucumbers, for example, which are 95% water and where moisture retention is crucial for freshness – after all, nobody likes a limp, shrivelled cucumber. Saveggy’s SaveCucumber innovation acts as a protective shield, preserves the water content, and slows down oxidation, extending the shelf life of an uncoated, unpackaged cucumber by three to four times.

Impressing legislators and investors alike

“We are excited and proud to support the team at Saveggy and their innovation in reducing food waste, advancing sustainable agriculture, and proactively complying with upcoming plastic waste regulations,” said LRF Ventures investment director Martin Alexandersson.

In March, the EU agreed to ban single-use plastics for fresh fruit and vegetable packaging (among other applications), in response to the rise in packaging waste in the region. This means all packaging in the bloc must be recyclable by the end of the decade, and starting next year, recyclable packaging will need to be recycled at scale – in 2020, only 38% of plastic packaging waste in the EU ended up being recycled.

Such regulations will raise the stock of startups like Saveggy, which claims to be the only plastic packaging alternative offering the same shelf life extension, and the only company to be given the all-clear from the EU for edible fruit and produce coatings. And the bloc has recognised its potential too, with the European Research Agency and the European Commission providing it with a €440,000 grant under the Eurostars programme last year.

For its SaveCucumber product, cucumbers are harvested, washed and dried, before being coated with the invisible layer. The company is also working on similar coatings for other produce like bananas, bell peppers and aubergines. Its investors will now look to leverage their supply chain networks to extend Saveggy’s presence to more distributors.

“We were particularly impressed by the founders’ perseverance, having refined their formula multiple times to meet the highest standards,” said Messel. “This unwavering commitment to innovation and sustainability aligns perfectly with our mission as impact investors and made our decision to partner with them clear.”

Saveggy is testing its products with partners, and will enter a market populated by the likes of industry leader Apeel (US), Sufresca (Israel), PolyNatural’s Shel-Life (Chile) and Liquidseal (Netherlands), all of which are making plant-based coatings for fruits and vegetables. Boston-based Foodberry (formerly Incredible Foods), meanwhile, is reverse-engineering fruit skins to make edible packaging for snacks.

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Japanese eco materials startup Spiber has secured ¥10B ($65M) in funding to accelerate mass production of its fermentation-derived Brewed Protein for use in the fashion, automotive and personal care industries.

In what is a major capital investment for the Yamagata-based startup, Spiber has closed a ¥10B ($65M) investment round to further expand production of its climate-friendly Brewed Protein materials, taking its total funding to $489M.

The financing included participation from existing shareholders, and will be used to accelerate the mass production of its fermentation-derived fibres, resins, films and other materials, and facilitate its global expansion. It will also seek to strengthen its production system and R&D platform to meet an expected growth in demand and more diversifying needs.

“We are grateful for the continued support and confidence from our investors, financial institutions, and partner companies who deeply understand the value of our technology platform, development materials, and business prospects,” said Spiber co-founder and CEO Kazuhide Sekiyama. “Despite the challenging fundraising environment for startups amidst the global economic landscape, we have been able to sustain our growth thanks to their recognition and expectation.”

Using microbial fermentation to produce future-friendly materials

Fiber was founded in 2007 by Sekiyama, Hideya Mizutani and Junichi Sugahara, and uses microbial fermentation to turn produce into eco-friendly materials for fashion, automotive and personal care products.

The company leverages synthetic biology and material science to make its Brewed Protein materials, which can act as alternatives to animal-based, plant-based, as well as synthetic materials for multiple applications, including textiles, which is Spiber’s current primary focus.

To make the Brewed Proteins, the startup uses agricultural waste as feedstock, which helps advance its mission of achieving a circular economy. This can be turned into fermented polymers that can substitute cashmere, fur, wool, leather and silk, plus fossil-fuel-derived, plastic-based synthetic fabrics.

The Brewed Protein platform is completely bio-based, biodegradable, and cruelty-free. It means the company requires much fewer resources to produce its materials, and has a much lower climate footprint as a result. For example, its Brewed Protein fibres can emit up to 75% fewer GHG emissions than cashmere, while using 94% less water and taking up 86% less land. Similarly, it needs 86% less land than merino wool, too, and 97% less water.

In 2018, it began constructing a commercial-scale facility in Thailand (which is now operational), and is currently building another in Iowa in the US. “We remain committed to the establishment and enhancement of the biotechnological foundations essential for realizing a circular society, as well as fulfilling our responsibility for social implementation as a frontrunner in this sector,’ said Sekiyama.

A host of brand collaborations underline Spiber’s success

The company’s materials have been refined through 17 years of research, which it says are meticulously designed at the DNA level. Their potential has been recognised by investors – as can be evidenced by the sums it has raised – and industry players alike. It’s engaged in joint projects with various apparel brands and has had 15 companies launch products using its materials.

These include Pangaia, The North Face, Yonetomi Seni, Goldwin, Nanamica, Cavia and Woolrich in the fashion industry, Shiseido Japan in the cosmetics space, and Toyota in the automotive world (which launched a concept vehicle using its Brewed Protein fibres last year). And, as part of its circular economy initiative, the startup has rolled out a biosphere circulation project that promotes biodegradable textile waste as a new material, working alongside partners like Kering, Eileen Fisher, Johnstons of Elgin, and DyStar.

Spiber has also benefited from labelling conventions, with the International Organization for Standardization revising the definition of “protein fibre” in 2021 to include not just naturally-derived proteins, but also those produced synthetically, alongside setting the minimum protein content required for such fibres at 80%. This made it the first time synthetic structural protein materials have been recognised internationally as a new material category.

And, earlier this month, the company unveiled a new denim fabric made in collaboration with fellow Japanese manufacturer Ueyama Textile, which uses 35% Brewed Protein fibres and 65% organic cotton. It represents an upgrade from its current denim made with 5% Brewed Protein and 95% cotton from denim giant Nihon Mempu.

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Vyld, the female-founded Berlin startup making sustainable period products from algae, has secured a seven-figure sum in seed funding that includes a financing instrument they created themselves.

Three years after launch, Vyld has raised funding worth seven figures using a novel financing model, helping its mission to disrupt the feminine care industry. The company will use the investment to launch Kelpon, the world’s first tampon made from seaweed, and accelerate the development of its period diaper.

The investment is a combination of German government and EU funds, and angel and VC capital, leveraging a self-developed sustainable financing instrument, the Future Profit Partnership Agreement (FPPA). Created by co-founder Ines Schiller, the model blends the advantages of equity and debt capital, and aligns with Vyld’s vision of steward ownership and self-sustenance.

The startup will use the funds to launch to market what it claims is the world’s first tampon made from seaweed, while continuing to develop its incontinence pads. It’s part of a long-term vision of creating an Algaeverse of healthy, sustainable and circular products tapping seaweed’s potential to develop a regenerative economy and promote ocean conservation, which helps Vyld contribute to 12 of the 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals.

Built on a unique regenerative financing model

Crafted by Schiller, a former film producer, Vyld’s mezzanine financial instrument ensures the company remains independent, allowing profits to be reinvested, used to cover capital costs, or funnelled into philanthropic purposes – all the while enabling an appropriate return for investors. Instead of having an exit-based model like traditional VC startups, Vyld focuses on longer-term sustainability.

Steward ownership has two core principles. The first is self-governance, which means the voting rights of the company always remain with active employees, rather than external investors. The second is a profit-for-purpose approach, which means its profits can’t be privatised. So instead of being redistributed to shareholders, they’re reinvested in the company’s mission. It means that Vyld as a business owns itself.

Under the FPPA, the startup offers profit shares instead of a conventional equity round. Once the returns are achieved, the agreement ends. This means new investments can be secured outside of the typical equity round cycle, giving the company financial independence. This model appeals to investors who are interested in regenerative financing and are critics of maximalist financial principles.

“Tackling questions of ownership, power and financing is crucial to me as an entrepreneur. Business models create realities and extractive models do not only threaten the environment and health, but also reproduce exploitative standards and anti-democratic tendencies,” explained Schiller. “We want to counter this with a model that promotes creation instead of consumption, quality instead of quantity and triple top line instead of hypergrowth.”

Kai Viehof, one of Vyld’s investors, added: “Vyld shows that neither shareholder-value-driven venture capital nor unbridled growth is needed to successfully implement sustainable ideas that really make a difference for our planet and our society. However, change can only become possible on a broad scale if investors also rethink and provide the necessary capital fairly and with reasonable return expectations.”

As part of the company’s knowledge-sharing commitment, it is making this financial model available as an open-source case study to encourage other businesses to adopt a similar regenerative approach.

Vyld will release seaweed tampons this year, with diapers in development

Vyld was founded by Schiller and Melanie Schichan in 2021, with the long-term target of creating an entire ecosystem of non-food seaweed products under the Algaeverse, which entails both B2B and B2C offerings. The aim is to transform a menstrual health sector that produces high amounts of waste.

The startup claims that 90% of all period products employed are single-use, and plastic makes up a big chunk of their composition. Plastic comprises 90% of the content in disposable period pads, which is the equivalent of four plastic bags. It means these are not biodegradable and can take up to 600 years to decompose.

The seaweed Vyld uses in its menstrual products, though, biodegrades on land and in water, requires no fertilisers to grow, and doesn’t need to be bleached (unlike conventional tampons). Plus, it sequesters huge amounts of carbon and nitrogen while growing, offers anti-inflammatory benefits during use, and can also be applied across a range of materials, from tampon cores to external packaging.

The startup’s initial products are the Kelpon (a tampon) and Dyper (a diaper). The former was part of a successful trial with over 100 consumers late last year and is now being prepared for market launch. The latter is in pilot phase, part of a Windelwald (‘diaper forest’) project in partnership with German sanitary solutions company Goldeimer.

An algae-based compostable diaper without plastic or superabsorbent polymers, the Dyper is being trialled in 50 households both for everyday use and its potential as a humus fertiliser. The used diapers are composted under controlled conditions, and the fertilisers help plant a forest – hence the name ‘diaper forest’.

It’s an exercise in regeneration, marrying the ethos of the financial model with its product offering. It puts Vyld in pole position to disrupt a $30B market with sustainability and ethics at the heart of things.

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Exercise can be more sustainable now, thanks to Community Clothing’s new Organic Athletic sportswear line, which is free from plastics and can decompose in your garden in as little as a week.

Community Clothing, the sustainable clothing brand and social enterprise by Scottish fashion designer Patrick Grant, has launched a plastic-free and compostable sportswear line, inspired by clothing materials from the 70s.

Called Organic Athletic, the 13-strong range eschews the typical use of non-biodegradable, oil-based synthetic plastic materials – chiefly polyester, nylon, polyurethane and elastane – in sports clothing, and opts for plant-based textile technology instead.

70s materials inspire new sportswear range

“Roger Bannister broke the four-minute mile wearing cotton shorts, a cotton vest and leather shoes. And I played rugby as a kid wearing clothes made from all natural materials,” Grant told the Financial Times. “None of us thought we were wearing rubbish stuff at the time.”

His childhood inspired him to explore “if it was possible to make good sportswear out of the materials we used until the late 1970s”. The new collection is a result of five years of R&D, comprising shorts, sweatshirts, T-shirts and running vests.

Made from woven or knitted certified organic cotton, as well as natural Austrian woven rubber for the shorts, Grant sourced organic athletic wear from this period on eBay. Finding most of them in Germany, he reverse-engineered each piece to assess its yarn count and durability. He explained that the toughest part was to replace elastic use.

“Elastics are made from elastane, which is synthetic and oil-based,” he said. But it’s a key tool for durability, given cotton threads are susceptible to breakages. “We had to beef up the diameter of the thread.” The resulting collection – for both men and women – is fatter in appearance, but carries a retro look akin to vintage college varsity kits, and is suitable for a variety of sports and training activities.

Sportswear’s plastic problem

Plastics and synthetic fibres like elastane (made from polyurethane), nylon, polyester and acrylic have been used in sportswear for decades for stretchability and breathability, quick-drying and waterproofing capabilities, and thermal protection. While some brands have turned to recycled fibres for eco-friendlier clothing, they still shed microplastics into the oceans and soil.

These are harmful in more ways than one. Scientists suggest that a third of all plastic waste ends up in soil or freshwater, disintegrating into microplastics that enter the food chain. These tiny particles have already been discovered in the human body, and one study estimates that we eat 5g of microplastics per week on average (about the same as eating a credit card’s worth of plastic). In fact, there are 14 million tonnes of microplastics on the ocean floor and 24 trillion pieces of microplastic on the ocean surface.

But there is an awareness issue here. A 2023 survey by global sail racing league SailGP – covering 1,500 people in the UK, US and Switzerland – found that 54% of respondents were unaware of potential toxins hiding in synthetic technical sportswear. Having said that, 72% said they’d prefer plastic-free sportswear if available. It’s these attitudes that prompted plastic-free fashion label Mover to debut a six-piece capsule collection in collaboration with SailGP, made predominantly from organic cotton, merino wool and water-based printing methods.

And while UK-based Stripe & Stare offers a TENCEL Modal-based shirt that it claims is 100% biodegradable, it contains 5% elastane. It makes the Community Clothing Organic Athletic one of the only (if not the only) sportswear ranges that are both plastic-free and compostable. Once they reach the end of life, these clothes can be shredded and added to your compost heap – within a short time, ranging from a week to five months depending on your soil, they will fully decompose and leave no remains.

“Community Clothing Organic Athletic represents the most radical change in sportswear in two generations,” Grant said in a statement. “Moving away from oil-based sports clothes to 100% natural and biodegradable means now you can exercise and play sport and not harm the planet in the process.”

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Earthshot Prize-winning British startup Notpla’s seaweed-based packaging has become the ‘first and only’ material recognised as plastic-free by a European Union country, following a nine-month verification process under the EU’s Single-Use Plastics Directive (SUPD) by the Dutch government.

In July of this year, the Netherlands imposed a plastic tax on disposable plastic food containers, which mandates customers to pay 25 cents for food packaging for takeout and delivery purposes. The move was aimed at encouraging consumers to reduce their consumption.

It was part of the Netherlands’ strict drive against the single-use plastic industry, whose self-regulated and unsubstantiated claims were unsatisfactory. According to Notpla, the EU defines plastic as a material containing polymers that are chemically modified and/or synthetically polymerised, with the SUPD cracking down on these harmful materials with country-specific laws to prevent single-use plastics, require mandatory labelling, or implement taxes on the use of these materials – as the Dutch government has done in alignment with the Bloc’s regulation.

The Human Environment and Transport Inspectorate (ILT) – the Netherlands’ environmental body – tested thousands of material solutions and classified them as plastic, including those claiming to be plastic-free, like aqueous dispersion coating (which contains microplastics).

But Notpla, which makes biobased seaweed-based packaging, has now become the first material to be recognised as truly plastic-free, following a nine-month process by the ILT. The result was independently investigated by global sustainability firm Eunomia Research & Consulting.

Shaping up a more sustainable foodservice sector

The British startup uses natural extracts found in seaweed and doesn’t make any chemical modifications, which enables it to leverage the natural polymers to provide the grease and moisture resistance needed by food boxes to perform their function, and crucially, to bypass fossil-fuel-derived polymers.

The startup says that conventional containers and bioplastic alternatives can contain petrol-based coatings that “stick around forever” or release harmful toxins, its seaweed- and plant-coated solution can be recycled with existing paper streams or composted at home, “just like a fruit peel”.

Speaking about the milestone recognition from the Dutch government, Notpla co-founder Pierre-Yves Paslier said: “This sets Notpla apart and aligns perfectly with our mission to reduce society’s dependence on plastic. We look forward to helping Dutch restaurant owners meet their plastic reduction goals.”

Notpla, which was one of the winners of the Prince William-led Earthshot Prize in 2022, says its plastic-free food containers can prevent 15 million single-use plastic packaging units from being produced in the Netherlands (the company claims its solutions have diverted 3.5 million pieces of single-use plastic from entering the environment across all its markets). Companies using Notpla packaging would no longer need to charge consumers for the plastic tax, making it a win-win for both consumers and businesses alike.

The seaweed packaging will also help the catering industry reach its plastic reduction goals and ensure single-use items can still be used – for businesses that can’t implement reuse schemes due to hygiene or other factors, this is still a plastic-free solution.

A distribution partnership and other plastic-free applications

The startup, which has raised over £10M in funding, has entered a strategic partnership with Dutch manufacturer Conpax to produce and distribute plastic-free food packaging throughout Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg. Foodservice operators and other businesses will be able to buy Notpla’s food packaging starting in January, helping them achieve and promote their eco goals.

Conpax director Roy Suiskens said the collaboration will ensure the widespread availability of the seaweed-coated foldable cartons in the Benelux region. “From our own facilities in the Netherlands, we will design, manufacture and supply new sustainable single-use products made from Notpla-coated board and distribute this to the Benelux market who are calling out for this exact solution,” he explained.

Apart from its food packaging solution – which has been previously trialled by food delivery service Just Eat in the UK – Notpla has a host of plastic-free solutions for various applications. Its first flagship was Ooho, an edible packaging solution for on-the-go hydration during sporting events.

Its current product portfolio also includes a laundry sachet, ocean paper, and food oil pipettes, while it has developed prototypes or is working on energy gel pods, spice and bath oil sachets, lube and sunscreen pipettes, toothpaste and skincare pearls, as well as rigid cosmetics and product shells and cutlery.

Other companies working on plastic-free materials meant to replace plastic packaging include US-based Sway, London-based Flexsea and

The post Notpla: Earthshot Prize Winner’s Seaweed Packaging Named ‘First and Only’ Plastic-Free Material Under EU Regulation appeared first on Green Queen.

In its annual September event, Apple announced it’s ending the use of leather from all its products – including Apple Watch bands and iPhone cases – to meet its 2030 carbon neutrality target. While it remains tight-lipped on what its new FineWoven material is made out of, it says the eco-friendly micro-twill fabric contains 68% post-consumer recycled content.

For a company that’s always been known as a trailblazer, this move might have massive implications for the industry’s use of what’s always been seen as a premium material. Apple, whose corporate operations became carbon-neutral in 2020, has pledged to make its entire supply chain and product range carbon-neutral by 2030. Nixing leather is a giant step towards that goal.

Leather, which is derived from animal hide, has previously been touted as a byproduct of the meat and dairy industries – and its defenders cite its biodegradability and longevity as reasons for its supposed eco-friendliness. But critics argue is more a co-product than a byproduct, and in many cases, it’s the primary product.

Leather production is an energy– and water-intensive process linked to deforestation and biodiversity loss, and produces lots of hazardous chemicals during tanning, which are a detriment to human health. It also has a much higher carbon footprint at 110kg of CO2e per square metre compared to synthetic and plant-based alternatives. Not to mention, it has a huge role in animal exploitation.

Swapping leather for a new woven fabric

“Leather is a popular material for accessories, but it has a significant carbon footprint, especially at Apple scale,” Lisa Jackson, Apple’s VP of environment, policy and social initiatives, said at the virtual event. “To reduce our impact, we will no longer use leather in any new Apple products, including watchbands.”

Rumours were rife about this move in recent days, especially after all Hermès-branded leather bands for the Apple Watch were removed from the website prior to the event. The tech giant is replacing leather with its new FineWoven, which is said to have a suede-like texture and “significantly lower emissions” compared to leather. It has also collaborated with Hermès (which has previously partnered with a mycelium leather startup) on four new bands made with environmentally friendly materials.

And while the new FineWoven fabric is made from 68% post-consumer recycled content, it isn’t clear how much of that is bio-based. If there is plastic involved, that’s not much of a better sign for the environment. Plastic is a notoriously unsustainable product, taking a tremendously long time to break down and decompose.

Plastic production is also responsible for 3.4% all global greenhouse gas emissions, and its contribution is set to double by 2060. Additionally, plastic-based synthetic leather can shed toxic microplastics that can enter waterways – thus destroying aquatic life – and our food system.

So while waving goodbye to leather is great for the environment and animals, more transparency about the replacement materials would help the climate case for Apple, whose stock fell by 7% last week amid reports of an iPhone ban on China’s government officials (the country makes up 19% of Apple’s revenue, but less than 1% of its citizens work in the government).

Apple’s first carbon-neutral product

At the iPhone 15 launch event, Apple also unveiled its new Apple Watch lineup, which includes its first-ever carbon-neutral products. This is another step towards its 2030 climate goal, which is centred around slashing its carbon emissions by 75% from a 2015 baseline.

“For Apple Watch Series 9, we challenged ourselves to significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions from their three biggest sources: materials, electricity and transportation,” Jackson explained. “Maximising recycled and renewable materials in our products is key to Apple 2030, because they have a lower carbon impact than virgin materials.”

Apple’s new watch cases use 100% recycled aluminium, plus recycled gold, tin, copper, tungsten, cobalt and more. Its watch production operations now use 100% clean energy. To counter the energy emitted from charging the watches, Apple will match users’ expected electricity use by investing in global renewable projects.

As for transportation, the new Apple Watch packaging will be fully fibre-based and more compact, which can ship 25% more watches per trip. And Apple will employ low-carbon shipping modes – like shipping freights – even more for these products. The company claims that these combined efforts have led to a 78% decrease in carbon footprint, and the remaining amount is offset by “high-quality” credits from projects actively removing carbon from the atmosphere.

“At Apple, we have a longstanding and proven commitment to leading the fight against climate change. Our focus on renewable energy and low-carbon design has already driven industry-leading emissions reductions, and we’re not slowing down,” Jackson said in a statement. “We’ve achieved an important milestone in making the world’s most popular watch carbon neutral — and we will keep innovating to meet the urgency of the moment.”

The post Goodbye, Leather: Apple Ditches Luxury Material for Eco-Friendly Woven Fabric Alternative appeared first on Green Queen.

A more ethical and usually eco-friendly alternative to their mined counterparts, lab-grown diamonds have been making a lot of waves lately. But how are they made, just how climate-friendly are they, and are consumers buying them?

The hardest naturally occurring substance on earth, diamonds represent a $90 billion industry. But new concerns about diamond supply shortage and subsequent price increases have added to existing ones about their human rights, crime and climate-related issues.

All this has led to the lab-grown diamond boom. Research by industry analyst Paul Ziminsky shows that lab-grown diamond jewellery sales reached nearly $12B last year, growing by 38% year-on-year. In 2023, the industry has already surpassed that, with revenue amounting to $14.6B globally.

The problem with naturally mined diamonds

The diamond industry’s ethical problems have been widely covered. Terms like “blood diamonds” (you may recall the DiCaprio film on the subject) are synonymous with the sector, given the widespread use of child labour, accusations of hazardous working conditions, as well as extremely low wages, and criminal activity.

While the industry has introduced certification schemes that have largely banished unethical trading, diamonds’ environmental issues remain. And that’s due to the traditional way of obtaining natural diamonds: mining. Diamonds are usually mined through open-pit, underground or marine methods.

According to the Diamond Council of America, 250 tonnes of earth is shifted per carat of mined diamond. This requires a massive amount of fossil-fuel-derived energy, which releases carbon and greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. For each polished carat of mined diamonds, 160kg of greenhouse gases are released, according to S&P Global.

Beyond the energy requirements, diamond mining harms local ecosystems via soil erosion and water pollution. Further, shifting thousands of tonnes of rock and earth can reroute rivers and dams, leaving disastrous impacts on fish and wildlife; in come cases, it can even cause natural ecosystems to collapse entirely.

How lab-grown diamonds are made

Lab-grown diamonds aren’t a new phenomenon. Scientists have been trying to create synthetic diamonds ever since they discovered that diamonds consist of pure carbon back in 1797. The first proven lab-grown diamonds are attributed to multinational conglomerate GE, which created a prototype in 1951 that was deemed too small for gem use.

But it paved the way for GE to create the first gem-quality lab-grown diamond in 1971. It was made in conditions that mimicked those under the Earth’s crust, reaching 1,600°C in temperature. The process involved using a tube to introduce heat and pressure to a graphite seed in the centre, until it grew into a diamond. This method, which is highly complex and expensive, is called high pressure, high temperature (HPHT), which is one of the two most common methods of making lab-grown diamonds.

Today, most are made using chemical vapour deposition (CVD). It can happen at lower temperatures and pressures – this being a cheaper process – as diamond seeds are heated via carbon in a chamber, which causes the carbon to stick to the seed and grow into a larger diamond.

Detonation synthesis, where nano-sized diamond grains are created during the detonation of explosives containing carbon, is another method that was introduced in the 1990s. Meanwhile, a fourth way of making lab-grown diamonds involves treating graphite with high-power ultrasound, but it currently has no commercial applications.

Pricing, problems and premiums

With consumers looking towards products with more ethical and sustainable supply chains, lab-grown diamonds can be seen as viable alternatives. But it’s not as simple as that.

According to the S&P report, producing one polished carat of lab-grown diamonds releases 511kg of greenhouse gases on average – more than thrice than that of mined diamonds. However, this report was produced on the behalf of trade group the Diamond Producers Association, which has raised questions about bias and the validity of such claims.

Lab-grown diamonds have been growing in popularity, thanks to their identical physical and chemical composition to mined diamonds. Even diamond experts have been unable to tell the differences by eye – the only optical difference is an ‘LG’ (for lab-grown) inscribed at the stone’s base.

Another factor to consider? Price. The increase in interest can be ascribed to the affordability of diamonds made in a lab. They can cost over 70% less than natural diamonds. Ziminsky’s analysis revealed that a generic lab-grown diamond costs $1,425 per carat, while a generic natural one is priced at $5,185 per carat. It adds that global production of lab-grown diamonds has exploded in recent years (and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future), and this new production capacity has been driven by declining capital equipment and production costs, as well as growing investment.

But this affordability factor comes with a caveat. Lab-grown diamonds aren’t always seen as crown jewels, as they’re trumped by the premium status of traditional, natural diamonds. Some consumers have concerns about the authenticity of synthetic diamonds – one De Beers survey found that almost half (47%) of Americans didn’t agree with the statement that lab-grown diamonds are real. Another report found that they associate words like ‘fake’ and ‘artificial’ with these diamonds. Despite all this though, for many, consumers the promise of a bigger stone with a smaller price tag – and possibly a more sustainable origin – alleviates these concerns.

Sustainable diamond alternatives

This rise has seen many natural diamond companies turn to lab-grown diamonds. For example, De Beers, the world’s largest diamond mining company, has started an alt-diamond line called Lightbox, while Signet Jewelers – the largest diamond retailer in the world – has its own lab-grown range. Meanwhile, Brilliant Earth stocks what it claims sustainable natural and synthetic varieties.

And in 2021, Pandora announced it was doing away with mined diamonds and shifting to a fully lab-grown production. Last week, it renamed its diamond arm to Pandora Lab-Grown Diamonds to drive this change home.

But concerns remain about the energy use in the creation of lab-grown diamonds. And that’s where a whole host of sustainable brands come in. New York-based Vrai, for instance, makes zero-emissions diamonds using hydropower from the Columbia River in its Pacific Northwest foundry. Brilliant Earth, meanwhile, has a line of climate-neutral options.

There’s also Aether, which became the world’s first company to have vegan-certified diamonds. It captures carbon from air pollution to produce its diamonds in what is a positive-impact process. Each carat removes the equivalent of 20 tons of carbon, which is estimated to be higher than a regular American’s annual carbon footprint.

Similarly, British company Skydiamond uses captured carbon from the sky, water from rainfall, and solar and wind energy for its lab-grown diamonds. The process is touted to be carbon-negative, as it captures more carbon than it releases.

“We no longer need to dig these enormous holes in the ground – they’re visible from space, some of them,” explained Skydiamond founder Dale Vince. “We don’t need to do that to get diamonds, we can just make them from the sky in an entirely benign process.”

They might be divisive, and research is key, but lab-grown diamonds can truly be a gem of an innovation.

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