Why it is so hard to sell sustainability

Sustainability is a difficult subject. Many conversation partners are willing to accept that mankind pursues activities which endanger the planet, ecosystems, future generations, plants, animals. But they have a hard time accepting that human activities, worse: human thought, will have … Read more

Debrief Rio+20

Disappointment and resolve. Those were the general feelings in the Rio+20 debrief meeting, July 19 in The Hague. Disappointment because results had been meagre: merely the affirmation of previous agreements, without emphasis on their importance. As Kitty van der Heijden, … Read more

An avalanche on wheels

Having been the owner of a little house in the French campagne, visited each year, I had not been in the mountains for some twenty years. But finally we went there. Somewhere in the French Alps, near Morzine, we were … Read more

Why PEF is better than PET

Biobased PEF (polyethylene furanoate), the new feedstock for soft drink bottles (Coca Cola and Danone) is not only green, but also cheaper to produce than both fossil and drop-in green PET (polyethylene terephthalate). It also has better properties. Tom van … Read more