Going Nuts: A Comparative and Business Study on Greener Alternatives to Traditional Plastic Sachets using Coconut Husks

<p dir="ltr"><i>The global challenge of escalating solid waste generation, fueled by rising consumption patterns and population growth demands innovative solutions that balance societal needs with environmental responsibility. This paper investigates a significant contributor to plastic waste in the Philippines—single-use plastic sachets. Sachets comprise over 52% of the country’s plastic waste stream, calling for sustainable solutions to address this growing problem. In this light, this paper presents the feasibility of utilizing coconut husks, a readily available agricultural waste product, as a sustainable alternative material for sachet production. To facilitate a comparative analysis between plastic and coconut sachets, 3D models of both materials were created using SolidWorks. The resulting sustainability analysis of the 3D models revealed that coconut husk sachets offer significant environmental benefits, boasting a 2x improvement in carbon emission, 4x improvement in energy consumption, and a 0.5x and 0.25x improvement in air and water pollution compared to traditional plastic sachets at the expense of a 53% estimated production cost increase. To address this cost hike, the paper proposes a cradle-to-cradle business plan that leverages the environmental benefits of coconut husk sachets as a marketing strategy. The proposed business plan emphasizes increased social responsibility, brand image improvement, and future-proofing against stricter environmental regulations to alleviate the risen production cost. Ultimately, coconut husk sachets were argued to be a viable and sustainable alternative to traditional plastic sachets. Future research is recommended to further characterize the properties of coconut husk bioplastic film, conduct more market analysis to obtain more concrete cost values, and explore investment opportunities for establishing a large-scale production model.</i></p>