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Samsung Is Ditching Plastic Packaging In Favor of More Sustainable Materials (theverge.com) 63

Posted by BeauHD from the environmentally-friendly dept.
In a press release, Samsung said that it will be replacing plastic packaging with "environmentally sustainable elements" beginning this year. The Verge reports: The company announced today that it will replace the plastic used in phones, tablets and wearables for molds and accessory bags made with "eco-friendly materials." The company also says that it will also change the design for its phone chargers to reduce the use of plastics, "swapping the glossy exterior with a matte finish." The company will also replace plastic bags used to protect its air conditioners, refrigerators, TVs, and washing machines with recycled materials and bioplastics that come from non-fossil fuel sources. Finally, the company will begin using paper that's been certified by "global environmental organizations" in its manuals by next year.

Gyeong-bin Jeon the head of Samsung's Global Customer Satisfaction Center, says that the company is working to address "society's environmental issues such as resource depletion and plastic wastes," and that it wants to minimize the waste that it produces. In making the shift, Samsung pledges to use 500 thousand tons of recycled plastics and to collect 7.5 tons of discarded products by 2030.
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Samsung Is Ditching Plastic Packaging In Favor of More Sustainable Materials More

Samsung Is Ditching Plastic Packaging In Favor of More Sustainable Materials

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  • What about the package contents? (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    How eco-friendly is the production of integrated circuits and circuit boards? Wouldn't it be better to make products that last longer? Phones, tablets and televisions with software that can be updated? "The year of Linux on the desktop" is kind of here, but not in the form that I would have wanted. They just turned free software into proprietary building blocks.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by lsllll ( 830002 )

      lol. That's not what the end consumer sees! They see plastic in the packaging and they freak out (the kooky ones, anyways). "OMG! Why don't they use paper to deliver their product?"

      • My note four came fully packaged in paper and cardboard, with a plastic bag containing the headphones and a plastic sheet covering the each of phone and battery.

        I remember being impressed at how eco friendly that was, in early 2015.

        • Re:What about the package contents? (Score:5, Informative)

          by Luckyo ( 1726890 ) on Monday January 28, 2019 @05:42AM (#58032918)

          Fun part is, the current massive uptick in fairly high end cardboard production is in large part due to this trend spinning up. You can't deliver the product packaging in old school brown cardboard, it has to be shiny, with specific texture and that can survive rigours of weeks of oceanic travel without plastic packaging over the cardboard protecting it.

          I've even seen a recent news story on paper cups now starting to be made from cardboard only. For those who don't know, current paper cups have thin plastic lining inside because otherwise, seams leak when faced with hot or corrosive liquids. Apparently latest technology allows to make paper cups that can make seams that can take the temperature and even things like mild alcohol for a few hours before starting to leak.

          Environmentally friendly technology is popping up in fairly surprising places nowadays, and that's a great thing.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by q_e_t ( 5104099 )
            Who the heck is drinking corrosive liquids?
            • Orange juice is a corrosive liquid. Soda is a corrosive liquid. Coffee is a corrosive liquid.

            • Corrosive doesn't mean instant death. Things are corrosive at different levels. Did you know Cocacola used to contain phosphoric acid? Nowadays fruit juice is quite nasty. That wonderful caffeinated substance that has both bitter and sweet notes in it's flavour? Well those bitter notes are acidic and in combination with the water corrosive.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by lsllll ( 830002 )
        Y'all missed the point of my post. I was saying that for every piece of plastic in the packaging you DON'T see, there's a hell of a lot of shit that happens at the factory that would have you cringing. The plastic in the packaging is the LEAST of your problems.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Luckyo ( 1726890 )

      EU actually regulated some of the materials involved in production of electronics some time ago in terms of heavy metals and some other things iirc. It resulted in quite a few changes, some of which were good (less of certain toxic materials) and some of which were bad (less durable hardware).

      These are really hard things to get done right, both because of modern form of profit motive being exceedingly short term and because planned (and often enforced) obsolescence is critical for revenue in many areas of e

      • ROHS (Score:3)

        by sjbe ( 173966 )

        EU actually regulated some of the materials involved in production of electronics some time ago in terms of heavy metals and some other things iirc. It resulted in quite a few changes, some of which were good (less of certain toxic materials) and some of which were bad (less durable hardware).

        The regulations you are referring to are ROHS [wikipedia.org] and they are a good thing. It required changing some product designs but when engineered properly (which most things have been) the evidence seems to show [wikipedia.org] it does not result in less durable hardware. Tin whiskers were a concern but there appears to have been no significant increase in problems since the regulations went into effect 12 years ago. Most electronic components these days are ROHS compliant because it's easier to just go all ROHS than to try to jug

    • How eco-friendly is the production of integrated circuits and circuit boards?

      Not very but also not relevant. They are going to sell products and those products need packaging. It's a sunk cost [wikipedia.org] in a sense. It makes sense to make the packaging as eco-friendly as they can given they are going to be packaging something. Cleaning up the board manufacturing is an important but separate discussion. It's always irritated me how much unnecessary packaging products have these days so efforts to reduce the impact (and cost) of packaging should be applauded.

      Wouldn't it be better to make products that last longer?

      From Samsung's perspective the

      • Phones, tablets and televisions with software that can be updated?

        They already have this.

        The issue is not that the devices are technologically incapable of software updates. As sold, most phones get updates when their OEM says so, which causes issues on both fronts. For the bleeding edge crowd, the Google->OEM->carrier->end user run takes too long. In many cases, phones less than a year old end up not getting new OS updates, which bothers that crowd.

        On the other hand, the "don't move my cheese" crowd isn't a fan of when those updates come because it invariably changes the procedure of

    • First thought that came to me as well when reading the headline.

      Let's stop with the glued in batteries and make cell phones that can have their batteries replaced without resorting to a lab. And, allow the latest version on Android to be flashed without a lot of hurtles? Let the consumer decided if performance is at a point where the phone needs to be replaced.

      Oh yeah, they want me to spend $1000 or more on a new phone every 18 months.

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by Dustie ( 1253268 )

        Let the consumer decided if performance is at a point where the phone needs to be replaced.

        They did. Samsung sells what the consumer wants. That is why they are as big as they are. You and I might not agree but there is a reason why there isn't a huge selling Librem 6 Eco-friendly phone.

  • Titanium would be good (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    That stuff lasts a long time.

  • Tell me more... (Score:3, Funny)

    by wierd_w ( 1375923 ) on Monday January 28, 2019 @03:16AM (#58032690)

    I mean, I might be willing to pay "Greater than iDevice prices" if they used the right packaging.

    Take for example, if they made the packaging out of the tanned hides of plutocratic executives. I would pay top dollar for a phone wallet sewn from Mark Zuckerburg's pasty white skin. If I cant get it in that fashion, I would settle for Larry Ellison, or Brian Roberts, but that last one is pushing it. If you can somehow swing regulators, I would be willing to pay double for an Ajit Pai packaging.

    Now, to be sure they arent pulling a fast one, I need some DNA evidence to validate the packaging's origins. We can't have them using some 3rd world country as a resource to defraud the public, after all.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by quenda ( 644621 )

      I would pay top dollar for a phone wallet sewn from Mark Zuckerburg's pasty white skin.

      They can grow skin in vats now. The technology was developed to grow skin for burns victims, but if you can get a small sample of Zuckerburg's skin, you could soon be growing enough for thousands of wallets that pass a DNA test.

      • but it wont have hair. Follicular units are fastidiously difficult things to grow in vitro.

        No no, I will only settle for the company installing skin stretching balloons into the Facebook founder's fat bulbous body, to stretch it to epic proportions for skin harvesting. After all, he's already well compensated for his value to the company, and profits over all, right? Think of how much money Facebook could make by offering such a partnership!

    • I mean, I might be willing to pay "Greater than iDevice prices" if they used the right packaging.

      Samsung is a huge company which also makes things like washers, dryers, and refrigerators. From what I've seen (and we've been looking at refrigerators lately), their pricing in these other product categories is already well above the median.

      Like Apple, Samsung can probably afford to put money into more eco-friendly packaging options without too significantly hurting their bottom line.

    • You could build a political movement around this, one with all sorts of cool branding and stirring rallies.

      • I dunno, it's kinda hard to make a political campaign around a demand-side trend for genuine executive leather from real executives. Many in wallstreet would paint it the same way they painted Occupy, and some might even suggest that there are shades of nazi-ism, what with the demand for human skin being made into leather objects.

        Personally, I think it's just a good way to tell the executive culture that the 99% is tired of giving in to the demands for pounds of flesh, and wants some given back in return.

    • I mean, I might be willing to pay "Greater than iDevice prices" if they used the right packaging.

      Take for example, if they made the packaging out of the tanned hides of plutocratic executives. I would pay top dollar for a phone wallet sewn from Mark Zuckerburg's pasty white skin. If I cant get it in that fashion, I would settle for Larry Ellison, or Brian Roberts, but that last one is pushing it. If you can somehow swing regulators, I would be willing to pay double for an Ajit Pai packaging.

      Now, to be sure they arent pulling a fast one, I need some DNA evidence to validate the packaging's origins. We can't have them using some 3rd world country as a resource to defraud the public, after all.

      Oh, my. Did you forget to take your medicine again Mr. Lecter?

    • I would pay top dollar for a set of scissors not packaged in a plastic container which requires scissors to cut open.

  • Plastic is getting expensive.

    I once received a waterproof watch which was shipped in a container of water.

    If Samsung could create packaging that contained canvas shopping bags, it would be good. Organic stuff like paper is just one more carbon dump I'll recycle or burn in the backyard.

    • Re:In other words (Score:4, Informative)

      by tlhIngan ( 30335 ) <[ten.frow] [ta] [todhsals]> on Monday January 28, 2019 @05:17AM (#58032882)

      Plastic is getting expensive.

      I once received a waterproof watch which was shipped in a container of water.

      If Samsung could create packaging that contained canvas shopping bags, it would be good. Organic stuff like paper is just one more carbon dump I'll recycle or burn in the backyard.

      Or more like plastic is not as recyclable. It's stupidly cheap to produce (and oil prices are quite low at the moment, as well). In fact, it's so cheap that recycling plastic is uneconomical, and it lasts basically forever. And unfortunately, most tossed plastic unless landfilled tend to end up in the ocean.

      Paper can be composted, recycled, or disposed of in many ways. Even if you threw it in the garbage, it'll be broken down within a year or so. And if it reaches the ocean, it'll decompose even faster.

      But beside the box, would the the plastic bags inside, which is unrecyclable in most recycling programs because it jams the machines. It's so bad that many recycling centers will simply landfill plastic bags and their contents when encountered in the recycling stream.

      • In fact, it's so cheap that recycling plastic is uneconomical,

        It's not just a matter of cost. There are basically two types of plastics - thermoplasts and thermosets.

        • A thermoplast [wikipedia.org] is kinda like metal. You can heat it to soften or melt it, and reform it. These are sort of recyclable.
        • A thermoset [wikipedia.org] is like a hard-boiled egg. Once it's set in the final shape, it cannot be reformed. They cannot be recycled, except by being shredded and used as filler.

        It's so bad that many recycling centers will simply landf

    • I once received a waterproof watch which was shipped in a container of water

      This reminds me of a guy who was sent a Thermos King thermos to do a review of. They literally brewed him some fresh coffee and sent it to him overnight for the review.

  • We found something even cheaper than plastic to house our crap, but it's also even more crappy. So we have to spin something to sell it.

  • I used to buy loose-leaf tea online fairly regularly from a place that would use styrofoam peanuts to pack their orders. They didn't need to as it was unbreakable and they used boxes that were just about full for the order. I would write in the comments not to use the styrofoam peanuts but they continued to do so.

    So I wrote to the company and asked them to stop. They replied that it was okay to use them because they were made from a "bio" source and not fossil fuels. In response I said it didn't matter what

  • Otherwise, they would not be Samsung devices.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Dustie ( 1253268 )
      Put Apple parts in it to make it even more explosive. Oh wait. Samsung parts ARE Apple part, just without an Apple logo.

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