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Plastic or foil?


Whenever I open the drawer to wrap something I always reach for the plastic wrap because this is what my family has always used, but every time I have to throw away a piece of plastic wrap I get an awful feeling of wastefulness.

I have done a little research about when you should use one or the other and what the environmental effects of each foil and wrap have on the environment.


Foil

What it's best for: If you're refrigerating something smelly, foil creates a stronger barrier to keep odors in. Just be sure to seal as tightly as possible. Foil is also ideal if you'll be reheating the food in a conventional oven, since it can withstand heat. It’s also good to wrap a snug layer of foil around plastic-wrapped foods you plan to freeze like meat because it keeps out oxygen, which causes freezer burn.


Plastic

What it's best for: Keeping acidic foods such as fruit or avocados from browning, and keeping other foods like sandwiches and cut produce fresh. And when you're using a dry marinade or spice rub, you can speed up the rate of absorption by snugly wrapping the meat between two sheets of plastic wrap.
 
 
Environmental impacts:

I am going to leave the results to the professionals on this one. In a study done by The Green Lantern it was found that:

“Aluminum foil was the loser in nearly all the metrics Compass assesses, including fossil fuel consumption, greenhouse gas emissions, human health impacts, aquatic toxicity and potential for eutrophication (a kind of water pollution, caused by excessive nutrients, that can lead to fish-killing algal blooms).

However, there are ways that foil can narrow those gaps.

Reusing it is one straightforward option. According to Compass, if you use one piece of foil three times, it will contribute less aquatic toxicity than using three pieces of LDPE, and it just about matches the plastic on fossil-fuel usage and eutrophication. You'd have to use that foil six times, however, before the greenhouse gas emissions and human health impacts were also comparable.

Foil made with recycled aluminum can reduce the impacts associated with manufacturing. Aluminum, unlike plastic or paper, can be recycled forever. According to one industry estimate, household foil already includes 25 to 40 percent pre-consumer recycled material -- i.e., factory scraps and trimmings -- with the rest coming from freshly mined, virgin metal. The Lantern knows of two companies, Reynolds and If You Care, that make foil with what's billed as "100 percent recycled content." In Reynolds's case, that content is a fluctuating mix of pre-consumer and post-consumer material (i.e., metal that's already had a life as a can or a pot). If You Care foil contains only pre-consumer material.”


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