Homepage Ping Publicity newsroom

New stretch wrap will biodegrade in landfill within 1-5 years

Announcement posted by Ping Publicity 30 Nov 2018

Australia's first landfill-biodegradable plastics available now

A geologist and an engineer from Melbourne have created an innovative suite of landfill biodegradable packaging supplies including stretch wrap, packing tape, pallet caps and doculopes, for companies 100% committed to environmental responsibility.

BioGone’s landfill-biodegradable plastics incorporate an organic food source additive in the plastic at the time of manufacture. When disposed to a landfill, they attract naturally occurring microbes that exist in landfill that seek out the food. In the process, the microbes secrete enzymes that break down the long polymer molecules of the plastics, digesting them to form a humus where no plastic residue is left.

BioGone founders, John Mancarella and Dr Ross Headifen, said that while more companies are now going the extra distance to reduce their environmental footprint when producing products, many are often let down by irresponsible packaging materials – just because there aren’t any friendly options.

“That’s what happened to us,” explained Dr Headifen. “As creators of landfill-biodegradable testing products for the groundwater and soil sampling industry, our company Fieldtech Solutions was stuck using irresponsible stretch wrap and packing tape when shipping to our customers”

“The shipment may have only travelled across town, meaning those packaging items only had a useful life of a few hours and then thrown away to languish in landfill for hundreds of years.”

“We had to do something about it. As we already used the technology for our products, we thought, why not apply it to packaging supplies so like-minded companies could also benefit? And BioGone was established.”

BioGone supplies a range of landfill biodegradable plastic products for both commercial and consumer use including cling wrap, resealable bags, gloves, dog and nappy waste bags. For more information, visit our website www.biogone.com.au

About Ross Headifen, Co-founder, BioGone

Ross has a PhD in mechanical engineering specialising in prototype machine development. Following a 13-year career in the contaminated land and similar industries involving water quality and soil contamination, he moved to Tanzania with his wife where they volunteered to work with local drillers to install water bores in rural villages to alleviate the suffering of women who spent countless hours each day looking for water.

Upon his return to Melbourne, he met and joined the first beach patrol groups in Albert Park and Port Melbourne, later instigating a widespread beach patrol movement across Victoria that now includes 31 local communities. Beach Patrol is the largest volunteer group picking up rubbish across Victoria with many groups conducting school visits and community events to raise awareness about the plastic problem. As VP of Beach Patrol, he recently met with Prince Harry and Meghan Markle at South Melbourne beach to show them Beach Patrol’s activities in cleaning up plastic and other waste on our beaches.

In 2012, Ross established FieldTech Solutions with co-founder John Mancarella to develop a suite of landfill-biodegradable products specifically for the groundwater and soil sampling industry. Quickly realising that there were no environmentally friendly packaging options while shipping out orders using stretch wrap, packing tape and envelopes, the duo decided to create their own landfill biodegradable plastic packing products. In 2015, Bio-gone was established to make their landfill biodegradable products available to like-minded consumers and commercial organisations.

He continues to campaign for a Cash for Containers scheme in Victoria to reduce plastic in our waterways and diverting some 124,000 tonnes of materials from landfill each year.

About John Mancarella, Co-founder, BioGone

John has a science degree in geology and has worked as a geologist and an environmental consultant. He later joined an equipment supply company for the groundwater and contaminated land industry where he met co-founder Ross Headifen.

In 2012, the duo formed Fieldtech Solutions with the aim of reducing the amount of plastic waste in the groundwater and contaminated land industry. The designed products used recycled plastic and landfill biodegradable plastic for single use disposable items for sampling.


MEDIA CONTACT: Ping Chew, 0439 570 789