When marine biologist Ranah Chavoshi surfaced from a dive in Borneo wrapped in grocery bags, she vowed revenge—in the nerdiest, most wonderful way.
Today her Canadian start-up PhyCo extrudes a fully compostable seaweed “plastic” that breaks down in garden soil faster than an orange peel.
From Beach Gunk to Bioplastic Gold: Why Seaweed Beats Petroleum, Paper and Corn Starch
Metric | Ordinary Poly Film | Corn-Starch PLA | Seaweed Bio-Film |
|---|---|---|---|
Fossil inputs | 100 % | 0 % | 0 % |
Home-compostable | ❌ | ❌ (needs industrial heat) | ✅ |
Marine safety | Chokes turtles | Sinks & lingers | Dissolves in weeks |
Carbon math | Heavy emitter | Mild emitter | Carbon-negative farming |
Taste test* | Toxic | Tastes like fork | Mild umami 🤤 |
*We dare you.
A Global Wave of Kelp-Tech Titans
Notpla – London legends whose edible pouches won Prince William’s Earthshot Prize after runners ate the packaging at the London Marathon.
Sway – California crew printing glossy retail bags; they and India’s Zerocircle split the Tom Ford Plastic Innovation Prize.
DS Smith – Europe’s cardboard giant testing seaweed fibre as a grease-proof pizza-box coating.
Farm-Fresh Field Trials
PhyCo’s first big win isn’t coffee lids—it’s agricultural mulch film. Farmers roll plastic sheets over crops; traditional polyethylene shreds into toxic confetti, but kelp sheets fertilise the soil as they vanish. Pilot rows start this summer in British Columbia blueberry country—berry fields forever, minus plastic shards in your pie.
The Economics: When Green Gets Cheaper Than Black
Lightning-fast biomass – Seaweed grows 30–60 × quicker than land crops and needs zero fertiliser.
Regulation tailwind – The EU’s pending Single-Use Plastics Directive 2.0 will tax fossil films; compostables dodge the fee.
Corporate FOMO – Retailers from Tesco to Patagonia have “plastic-free by 2030” pledges—kelp ticks the CSR box and the marketing hype.
Potential Riptides
Ecosystem balance – Badly managed kelp farms can shade seagrass; guides like the WWF Seaweed Manifesto outline best practice.
Sticker shock (for now) – Seaweed film costs ~2–3 × cheap polyethylene; bigger orders + plastic levies are closing the gap.
Compost literacy – A new BPI seaweed standard will clarify “home-compost” labels.
How to Ride the Green Wave Yourself
Compost correctly – Toss seaweed film in your backyard pile; it’ll vanish in weeks.
Back ocean farmers – Try kelp pickles from Atlantic Sea Farms—profits keep coastal communities thriving.
Push retailers – Tweet your favourite store: “When will my mailer be kelp, not poly?” Squeaky social wheels get the eco-grease.
Refill, don’t sachet – Support projects like Greenpeace’s Kuha sa Tingi refill stations slashing Southeast Asia’s single-use packet tsunami.
The Take-Home
Seaweed isn’t just salad garnish anymore; it’s nature’s plug-and-play upgrade for fossil plastics. From marathon gel pods you can swallow to farm mulch that feeds the field, kelp tech sketches a future where packaging goes back to the earth—fast, clean, and maybe even tasty.
Surf more planet-positive breakthroughs in WholePeople’s Planet Progress newsletter—hit “Subscribe” before the tide rolls out!