Engineering360: "Team creates fully recyclable packaging materials"

First of all, they are confusing recyclable with degradable. They are certainly not the same. They also imply that PLA is not a plastic, which depends on the chemical definition of plastic, which the public neither knows nor cares about. There is good reason NOT to use degradable packaging (carbon dioxide regeneration, products of degradability in soil, contamination of recycle streams) but the push to avoid "plastic" is very strong, and quite understandable given the packagers' need to satisfy their customers, who are scared by chemistry and anything unnatural, which has led to popular negative images of plastics, despite their benefits to both health and the environment via water-resistance, nonsupport of bacteria, light weight (fuel saving) and nontoxicity despite beliefs to the contrary.

The fear of synthetic is connected to the fear of miracle-denying science, easily challenged by noting natural dangers (snake venom, bacterial pathogens, even poison ivy) and synthetic life-saving compounds from insulin to aspirin. To many, however, it doesn't matter.