In form-fill-seal production, each step in the process is designed and tweaked to squeeze the most productivity or efficiency out of beverage bottling. Traditionally, most blow-molding operations use compressed air to form the plastic bottles. But a new process introduced by Amcor and Sidel is gaining momentum. LiquiForm technology pressurizes the product liquid to form and fill the bottles in one step, promising to eliminate equipment and processing steps, and reduce waste and energy consumption.

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In packaging, we're seeing green. We're witnessing more bio-based materials, more renewable feedstocks, and more sustainable packaging initiatives than ever. Some suppliers say that making bioplastics consumes far less fossil fuel and emits fewer greenhouse gas emissions than manufacturing petro based plastics. But is green chemistry as good as the PR surrounding it says it is?

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"Buy American" campaigns seem to arise in each major economic downturn that the U.S. experiences, in the 1970s, in the 1980s, and on. So, we are seeing the rise of economic nationalism again, a re-emergence of "Buy American" sentiment. With it, we hear the rationale that "buying American" saves U.S. jobs. But plenty has been written in the past about such protectionist ideas in the era of globalization. Would it work any better today?

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A strong majority — roughly 75% — of people in North America and the UK support geoengineering studies, that is, those that would test man-made conditions to reflect sunlight back to space to cool the planet. Is the effort feasible? Would we be better off with research results on actions we might consider taking in the future?

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"BlackBerrys have stopped working." That recent headline was sobering, as millions lost their phone and email connectivity — an unexpected event from a major corporation's network. Yet the complaints made it clear that Americans consider constant connections a birthright, a privilege. Instead, shouldn't the event simply have reminded us the vulnerability of many of our systems, and that we shouldn't expect 100% connectivity; just as we learned to deal with occasional electricity brownouts and blackouts. Where's the tolerance?

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