Comparative life cycle assessment of plastic and paper packaging for pasta

In this study life cycle assessment was performed to compare the environmental impact of traditional plastic packaging for pasta with an innovative paper packing. Two kinds of packaging solutions were involved in the study: a tight packaging, used for long pasta and a loose packaging, used for short pasta. The substitution of plastic with paper allows to decrease the environmental load according to relevant impact categories such as global warming potential and depletion of fossil fuels. On the other hand, the higher mass of paper packaging causes a higher environmental impact on impact categories such as eutrophication and ozone depletion. Quite interestingly, it was observed that tight packaging used for long pasta is characterized by an environmental impact reduction of around 30% due to the lower material consumption caused by the lower volume occupied by long pasta with respect to the short one. The advantages arising from the substitution of plastic with paper for packaging applications seem very limited, mainly due to the different properties of the two materials that require a larger paper amount to substitute plastic in the same application.