Amazon Finally Ditches Plastic Air Pillows, but Environmentalists Say It’s Not Enough

After years of pressure from biology advocates, the planetary retail elephantine Amazon announced past week that it has eliminated integrative aerial pillows from its planetary web of “fulfillment centers,” arsenic Amazon calls its warehouse and organisation facilities. Around the world, products wrong the company’s packages are present cushioned by paper-based padding that tin beryllium collected successful curbside recycling programs.

“We are committed to improving however orders are shipped, for the bully of customers and the planet,” Amazon wrote successful a blog post.

The announcement represents the fulfillment of a committedness Amazon made successful June to enactment “toward afloat removal” of integrative aerial pillows from North America by the extremity of the year. At that time, the institution said it had already replaced 95 percent of its aerial pillows crossed the continent with insubstantial filler. Years earlier that, successful 2021, Amazon eliminated integrative aerial pillows successful Australia, and successful 2022 it did the aforesaid for orders shipped from its warehouses successful Europe.

Oceana, a nonprofit water advocacy group, has dogged Amazon for respective years implicit its  usage of plastics, mostly done a series of reports quantifying the company’s wide integrative footprint and its publication to aquatic integrative pollution. Matt Littlejohn, Oceana’s elder vice president for strategical initiatives, said Amazon’s announcement is “actually rather significant,” adjacent though the phaseout doesn’t use to orders shipped by third-party sellers. Amazon hasn’t disclosed what fraction of its income are fulfilled successful that way. “It’s large quality for the oceans and for the globe successful wide that the world’s biggest e-commerce institution did this,” Littlejohn said.

Amazon’s integrative aerial cushions are present a happening of the plast. Image: Amazon.

Still, Amazon continues to usage tens of thousands of tons of integrative each twelvemonth successful different forms of packaging—much of it thin, filmy integrative utilized successful transportation bags and padded mailers. Plastic movie is not lone virtually intolerable to recycle, but besides the most communal signifier of integrative litter successful coastal waters and the most lethal benignant of plastic to ample marine animals. Oceana and different biology groups accidental the institution should fortify its plastic-reduction promises by mounting deadlines to determination distant from each types of single-use integrative packaging, and scaling up reusable alternatives.

“We privation the institution to marque a committedness to bash more,” Littlejohn told Grist. He said Amazon’s actions could power different ample retailers to besides trim their plastics use.

Amazon is 1 of the largest companies successful the world, with an estimated worth adjacent $2 trillion and yearly gross supra $600 billion. It operates successful 21 countries and ships to galore more. In the U.S., Amazon controls nearly 40 percent of the e-commerce market.

So far, Amazon’s top advancement connected integrative simplification has happened successful planetary jurisdictions, perchance owed to stronger regulations connected single-use plastics. The company’s warehouses successful India person been plastic packaging-free since 2020, and its European organisation centers stopped utilizing integrative transportation bags successful 2022. Those changes contributed to a 9 percent self-reported diminution successful planetary integrative usage betwixt 2022 and 2023, according to an Amazon spokesperson.

Plastic simplification has been slower successful the U.S., possibly due to the fact that of the sheer size of its largest market. Oceana has estimated that Amazon generated 208 cardinal pounds of integrative packaging trash successful the United States successful 2022—about 10 percent much than the erstwhile year—although this doesn’t relationship for the company’s astir caller efforts to modulation to paper. In its caller blog post, Amazon said it has present retrofitted much than 120 automated packing machines crossed the state truthful they tin marque insubstantial bags, alternatively than integrative ones.

Amazon besides hinted successful its 2022 sustainability report that it was “phasing retired padded bags containing plastics,” presumably referring to its ubiquitous blue-and-white mailers. Littlejohn said Amazon should marque this committedness much precise by clarifying its geographical scope and a timeline for accomplishing it.

The institution besides said successful its most caller sustainability report that it’s “working to trim our usage of single-use integrative packaging successful favour of household-recyclable alternatives.” Littlejohn said that the accent connected curbside recycling — alternatively of specialty take-back programs astatine retail stores — is meaningful. Currently, the company’s blue-and-white mailers diagnostic a statement directing customers to “store drop-off” recycling receptacles astatine locations similar Kohl’s, Safeway, and Stop & Shop. But investigations from the media and biology groups person shown that integrative collected successful these receptacles is often sent to landfills and incinerators, alternatively than to a recycler. Plastic movie that does get reprocessed is downgraded into nonrecyclable products similar platform chairs.

In effect to Grist’s petition for comment, an Amazon spokesperson pointed to antecedently announced integrative simplification efforts, including the implicit elimination of integrative packaging from 2 U.S. organisation facilities.

“We admit the value of reducing single-use plastic, successful the U.S. and globally, but this can’t beryllium done overnight,” the spokesperson wrote successful an email. They went connected to accidental that Amazon is “obsessed with getting this close for customers, and we’re incredibly arrogant of the advancement truthful far.”

Amazon besides said successful its blog station from past week that its archetypal precedence is “to region packaging altogether,” meaning it tries to vessel products successful their archetypal packaging alternatively than adding Amazon-branded sleeves, bags, boxes, and padding. As of December of past year, Amazon was shipping one-third of its income successful North America without immoderate further packaging, and it said it would summation this fraction to two-thirds by December 2024.

As You Sow is simply a nonprofit shareholder advocacy enactment that has filed several resolutions astatine Amazon asking the institution to disclose and trim its integrative packaging footprint. Conrad MacKerron, the organization’s elder vice president, noted that determination are inactive plentifulness of opportunities extracurricular of Amazon’s e-commerce concern to chopped down connected unnecessary integrative packaging. For example, helium said, Amazon sells galore private-label nutrient and beverage products that are packed successful flexible plastic, similar bags of nuts and candies. These products lend to integrative pollution, even if they’re shipped to buyers successful a insubstantial envelope.

Amazon besides owns Whole Foods, 1 of the largest market chains successful the United States, wherever full aisles of products are sold successful flimsy integrative packaging that is virtually intolerable to recycle. Many of these products are sold nether the Amazon-owned statement 365 by Whole Foods Market. “Unlike PET bottles, that flexible packaging cannot beryllium recycled truly anyplace successful the satellite astatine this point. All of that goes to the landfill,” MacKerron said. He said he’d similar to spot Amazon “reevaluate” its market store integrative use, “given that there’s thing connected the skyline that’s going to supply a recycling option” for it.

This nonfiction primitively appeared successful Grist. Grist is simply a nonprofit, autarkic media enactment dedicated to telling stories of clime solutions and a conscionable future. Learn much astatine Grist.org.