Our Plastic Future

This summer on the podcast, we’ve traced plastic from its unwitting past to its overwhelming present. But who is going to deal with our plastic future?

More than any other generation, Gen Z’s lives have been marked by climate change and climate anxiety.

On the new episode of Trace Material, we speak to young climate activists to understand how they’re imagining a future away from plastics.

17-year old activist Vivian Tan sees one possible answer in bioplastics. But are bioplastics a magic bullet? We speak to Dr. Amy Congdon to learn what exactly bioplastics are, and what they can and can’t do.

Grace Cuddihy, another young activist and organizer, shares their take on the future of plastics, the zero waste movement, and political organizing for climate action.

Subscribe and listen to the episode on Apple, Spotify, Stitcher, or anywhere you listen to podcasts.

Click here for a full transcript of the episode.

For more info on the various classifications of biomaterials, check out these resources from Biofabricate

Trace Material is a project of Parsons Healthy Materials Lab at The New School. It is hosted and produced by Ava Robinson and Burgess Brown. Our project director is Alison Mears, and our research assistant is Olivia Hamilton. Trace Material was made possible by funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities. Our theme music is Rainbow Road by Cardioid. Additional music from Blue Dot Sessions.

Contributors:
Dr. Amy Congdon, Head of Design Intelligence at Biofabricate
Vivian Tan, youth climate activist
Grace Cuddihy, youth organizer at TREEage