{"id":62496,"date":"2019-04-18T07:20:35","date_gmt":"2019-04-18T05:20:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/?p=62496"},"modified":"2019-04-15T15:11:53","modified_gmt":"2019-04-15T13:11:53","slug":"chilean-startup-makes-plastic-from-walnuts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/chilean-startup-makes-plastic-from-walnuts\/","title":{"rendered":"Chilean Startup Makes Plastic from Walnuts"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Chile-based startup Valnux recently developed an alternative to plastic using walnut shells. The material is made by grinding up the shells and putting them through a process used by the plastics industry. The result is a biodegradable thermoplastic with antibacterial and antimicrobial properties (thanks to juglone, a molecule found in walnuts).<\/p>\n<p>Engineers Patricia Olave and Natalia Valencia founded Valnux to reduce waste in Chile while finding unique solutions to the global plastic pollution crisis. While the company is starting with creating kitchen utensils such as cutting boards and fruit bowls, it is open to developing walnut-based bioplastic for other products, including food packaging.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe have different industrial possibilities for this material, but for food [applications] it is necessary to keep investigating properties like the permeability of gases or ultraviolet filtering,\u201d Olave told <a href=\"https:\/\/www.foodnavigator-latam.com\/Article\/2019\/04\/08\/Chilean-start-up-creates-bioplastic-from-walnut-waste\" target=\"_blank\"><em>Foodnavigator Latin America<\/em>.<\/a> \u201cAnd to be coherent with the ecological purpose of Valnux, it must come from natural components.\u201d In 2018, 12,000 tons of walnut shells were left in Chile\u2014the second largest global exporter of the nut variety, according to Valnux. The startup can produce more than 30 plastic-free cutting boards from one hectare of walnut waste per harvesting season.<\/p>\n<div class=\"BorlabsCookie _brlbs-cb-youtube\">\n<div class=\"_brlbs-content-blocker\">\n<div class=\"_brlbs-embed _brlbs-video-youtube\"> <img decoding=\"async\" class=\"_brlbs-thumbnail\" src=\"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-content\/plugins\/borlabs-cookie\/assets\/images\/cb-no-thumbnail.png\" alt=\"YouTube\"> <\/p>\n<div class=\"_brlbs-caption\">\n<p>By loading the video, you agree to YouTube&#8217;s privacy policy.<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/policies.google.com\/privacy?hl=en&amp;gl=en\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\">Learn more<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a class=\"_brlbs-btn _brlbs-icon-play-white\" href=\"#\" data-borlabs-cookie-unblock role=\"button\">Load video<\/a><\/p>\n<p><label><input type=\"checkbox\" name=\"unblockAll\" value=\"1\" checked> <small>Always unblock YouTube<\/small><\/label><\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div class=\"borlabs-hide\" data-borlabs-cookie-type=\"content-blocker\" data-borlabs-cookie-id=\"youtube\"><script type=\"text\/template\">PGlmcmFtZSB0aXRsZT0iVmFsbnV4OiBMYSBkaWZlcmVuY2lhIGVuIHR1IHJlY2V0YSIgd2lkdGg9IjUwMCIgaGVpZ2h0PSIyODEiIHNyYz0iaHR0cHM6Ly93d3cueW91dHViZS1ub2Nvb2tpZS5jb20vZW1iZWQvVnk4Rm12Y3NUSUU\/ZmVhdHVyZT1vZW1iZWQiIGZyYW1lYm9yZGVyPSIwIiBhbGxvdz0iYWNjZWxlcm9tZXRlcjsgYXV0b3BsYXk7IGNsaXBib2FyZC13cml0ZTsgZW5jcnlwdGVkLW1lZGlhOyBneXJvc2NvcGU7IHBpY3R1cmUtaW4tcGljdHVyZTsgd2ViLXNoYXJlIiByZWZlcnJlcnBvbGljeT0ic3RyaWN0LW9yaWdpbi13aGVuLWNyb3NzLW9yaWdpbiIgYWxsb3dmdWxsc2NyZWVuPjwvaWZyYW1lPg==<\/script><\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Chile-based startup Valnux recently developed an alternative to plastic using walnut shells. The material is made by grinding up the shells and putting them through a process used by the plastics industry. The result is a biodegradable thermoplastic with antibacterial and antimicrobial properties (thanks to juglone, a molecule found in walnuts). Engineers Patricia Olave and [&#8230;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":59,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","nova_meta_subtitle":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5572],"tags":[5847,7105],"supplier":[15672],"class_list":["post-62496","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bio-based","tag-bioplastics","tag-packaging","supplier-valnux"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62496","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/59"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=62496"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62496\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=62496"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=62496"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=62496"},{"taxonomy":"supplier","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/supplier?post=62496"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}