Three surfers who work as engineers at Cruz Foam developed biodegradable packing and shipping materials made from green pea starch. The company produces cost-competitive biofoam at scale aimed at replacing single-use plastics as the state implements a 2022 plastic pollution law. Investors and advisors include Leonardo DiCaprio and Ashton Kutcher, and customers range from The Caviar Co. to Atlantic Packaging's sustainable arm. Cruz Foam offers alternatives to extruded and expanded polystyrene foams that fragment into persistent microplastics, which contaminate soil and oceans, disrupt food chains, and infiltrate human organs and bones.
The surfers Cole Quinlan, Hudson Soelter and Amanda Vasconselos are engineers at Cruz Foam, a startup that has developed biodegradable packing and shipping materials out of green pea starch. As the state grapples with how to implement a landmark plastic pollution act signed into law in 2022, the company is producing cost-competitive biofoam at a scale it hopes will eventually rid the Earth of single-use plastics.
Cruz Foam has figured out alternatives to two fossil fuel-derived plastics that linger for eternity in tiny fragments called microplastics. Scientists say these have contaminated the soil, filled our oceans, disrupted food chains and penetrated most people's organs and bones. Extruded polystyrene (XPS) foam, known by its brand name Styrofoam, was invented in 1941 by Dow Chemical Co. scientist Ray McIntire.
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