It’s Time To Divest From Plastic — Ceramics Are One Viable Alternative – CleanTechnica

---

---

What will it take to complete a landmark treaty aimed at ending the plastic pollution crisis? Can countries around the world, which are pressured by the fossil fuel industry to protect its plastic manufacturing investments, actually divest from plastic?

Plastics Treaty negotiations began on August 5 and are due to conclude on August 14, 2025. United Nations member states are meeting in Geneva, Switzerland. Their failure to call for a vote at Friday’s stocktake plenary has put the fate of the plastics treaty in jeopardy.

Plastic pollution affects every ecosystem and person on the planet. Studies continue to uncover how toxicity from plastic impacts our bodies, water, and food systems. It is found from microplastics found in human blood and breast milk. Plastic chemicals are linked to cancer, hormone disruption, and fertility issues.

Greenpeace is calling for at least a 75% reduction in plastic production by 2040. “We will never recycle our way out of this problem,” exclaimed Graham Forbes, who leads the Greenpeace delegation.

In March 2022, 175 nations agreed to make the first legally binding treaty on plastic pollution by the end of 2024. It was to address the full life cycle of plastic, including production, design and disposal. About 100 countries want to limit production, tackle cleanup and recycling, and reduce toxic chemicals that are released from plastic usage.

Frankie Orona, executive director of the Texas-based Society of Native Nations, concurs, adding that Indigenous land, water, and air are being contaminated as fossil fuels are extracted and plastic is manufactured using hazardous chemicals. He decried last year’s treaty process, too, asserting that “despite our tireless advocacy and the support of numerous member states, the [latest treaty draft] fails to recognize our inherent rights and traditional knowledge, effectively silencing our voices in the fight against plastic pollution.”

As AP reports, instead of rejecting plastic production, about 300 businesses such as Walmart, the Coca-Cola Company, PepsiCo, and L’Oréal support push for increasing recycling and reuse. This coalition includes major food and beverage companies and retailers, which are propped up by plastic-producing and oil and gas countries that firmly oppose production limits.

Saudi Arabia, for example, is the world’s largest exporter of one common type of plastic and has led opposition to producing plastic — the responsibility should be on the rest of the world to address plastic pollution.

Nor does the US support global production caps or bans on certain plastic products or chemical additives to them. The US State Department is intent, instead, on improving waste collection,  management, product design, and recycling. “If the negotiations are to succeed, the agreement must be aimed at protecting the environment from plastic pollution, and the agreement should recognize the importance plastics play in our economies,” the State Department described in what is a contradictory statement.

Clearly, positions that push for continued plastic production are untenable. Between 19 million and 23 million tons of plastic waste leak into aquatic ecosystems annually, which could jump 50% by 2040 without urgent action, according to the UN. Every year, the world makes more than 400 million tons of new plastic, and that could grow by about 70% by 2040 without policy changes.

Previous impasses over cutting production loom heavily over this year’s conference. Yet the path to being able to divest from plastic materials could be smoother if more startups got support. Let’s look at one very promising plastic-free company.

GaeaStar Case Study: A Way to Begin to Divest from Plastic

Have you ever considered that, instead of succumbing to cups that are lined with plastic, ceramics might be a viable alternative? They’re inert, safe, and don’t leach harmful chemicals — a “drink-to-dust” technology.

I had the opportunity to try the GaeaStar ceramic cups, and they present like elegant, ancient ceramic vessels — nothing like traditional disposable drinkware. Made from just clay, salt, and water, these thin cups can be used multiple times for hot or cold drinks or other applications. Their packaging is composed of natural minerals like silica and quartz and mimics the egg’s ingenious design.

GaeaStar is a California-based company founded by Sanjeev Mankotia, with inspiration from his travels back home in India. There, tea is traditionally served in terracotta cups, or “kulhars,” which is an eco-friendly practice dating back 5,000 years. The name “GaeaStar” reflects this legacy, lending “Gaea,” the Greek goddess of Earth, with “Star,” inspired by “Tvastar,” the divine artisan in Hindu mythology, symbolizing craftsmanship and innovation.

GaeaStar offers a sophisticated option to single-use cups. By prioritizing convenience without compromising sustainability, the company offers cost-effective, plastic-free packaging and to-go solutions that push beyond the “bait-and-switch” approach of Big Plastic. Beyond product innovation, GaeaStar is dedicated to raising awareness and fostering a cultural shift—challenging single-use habits and promoting circularity for a more sustainable future.

The company’s core technology is designed to be versatile and scalable, with the potential to create plastic-free containers for a wide range of industries, including food and beverage, pharmaceuticals, and plastics across even more everyday products.

Building on positive feedback from cafes and retailers, GaeaStar is now expanding into the hospitality sector. It has partnerships with Populus Hotels in Seattle and Denver, Hotel Healdsburg, and Heckfield Place. For hotels, the ceramic cups can serve a s premium in-room drinkware, to-go cups for on-site cafes, vessels for lobby and spar refreshments, or packaging for custom products like skincare and cosmetics.

Key company innovations include automated material handling, where clay slurry is fed into machines. Robotic machine tending means hands-free production. New controls allow multiple SKUs to be produced using the same tooling — all of which minimize the time and cost of launching new products. A proprietary printing technique has enabled greater precision, thinner cup walls, and faster cycle time, all while reducing material usage.

Care: Clay cups are dishwasher safe, or they can be hand washed like any other ceramic. On average, customers reuse the GaeaStar cup at least three to five times.

Disposal: They don’t get recycled: ceramics are safely returned to the earth. Unlike plastic that lasts centuries, clay breaks down harmlessly by mechanical force into fine powder. There’s no soil or water contamination. Broken clay cups belong in the regular trash, not recycling or compost. That’s because when they reach their end-of-life, you return earth materials to the earth. In fact, disposed clay cups can get a second life as construction material or landfill cover that prevents the spread of contaminants.

GaeaStar ceramic cups are exactly the kind of products that scare the you-know-what out of major food and beverage companies and retailers that want to continue to profit off plastic pollution.

Final Thoughts about the Need to Divest from Plastic

Ceramics are clearly a way to divest from pollution. It will take the buy-in of polluting countries to change the narrative, however. On August 9, the WWF divulged that “ambitious countries not doing enough in Contact Group meetings to prevent what looks to be the delivery of a feeble, watered-down treaty, the full muscle of civil society organizations at INC-5.2 weighed in on Friday to call out Member States to ‘fix the process, keep your promise, and end plastic pollution’.”