Closed Loop Partners, a fund that invests in sustainable consumer goods, advanced recycling technologies and the development of the circular economy, invested $4.5 million in TemperPack to expand its ClimaCell™️ manufacturing operation to the company’s west coast facility in Las Vegas, Nevada. The latest funding initiative comes after the successful launch of TemperPack’s first production line of ClimaCell in their Richmond-based facility.
ClimaCell is TemperPack’s certified curbside recyclable insulation product used for perishable shipments in the food and pharmaceuticals industries. “When we were initially developing this new type of insulation, we looked at a range of recyclable materials, and ultimately landed on a paper-based design due to its high recyclability rate compared to plastic,” commented Michael Scipione, TemperPack’s Director of Research & Development. “Insulation performance is paramount in the cold chain industry, so we engineered ClimaCell to perform on par with EPS on an inch per inch basis,” he added.
ClimaCell provides a significant reduction in GHG emissions (est. 10x) over EPS used in insulated shipping today and the expansion of this manufacturing to TemperPack’s Las Vegas location will help reduce contamination at Material Recovery Facilities (MRFs). “From our MRF testing, we’ve seen that TemperPack’s ClimaCell packaging can greatly reduce the burden of Styrofoam ending up in the recycling streams,” stated Bob Milligan, VP of Operations Due Diligence at Closed Loop Fund. Currently, most of the insulated packaging on the market claims some level of recyclability but fails to pass the MRF sorting tests and ultimately ends up in a landfill. “The [ClimaCell] packaging has proven to make it through the OCC lines at MRFs,” he added.
“We couldn’t be more excited to work with Closed Loop Fund to expand our ClimaCell production to Las Vegas,” said Brian Powers, TemperPack’s co-CEO and co-founder. “This second manufacturing operation will make us even more cost competitive against EPS, ultimately giving companies no reason to use the outdated insulation.”
Founded in 2015, TemperPack solves thermal packaging problems through sustainable design. The company was born out of a desire to reduce the amount of unsustainable packaging that correlated with the rising world of e-commerce delivery. They specialize in bringing custom solutions for clients to scale in the perishable food and life sciences industries. Today, TemperPack operates two facilities in Virginia and Nevada and is rapidly expanding its reach in the perishable and cold chain shipping market, all with the goal of reducing the amount of packaging that ends up in landfills. For more information, visit www.temperpack.com
Founded in 2014, Closed Loop Fund is a social impact investment fund that provides cities access to the capital required to build comprehensive recycling programs. Closed Loop Fund aims to invest $100 million by 2020 with the goal to create economic value for cities by increasing recycling rates in communities across America and build circular supply chains. Closed Loop Fund brings together the world’s largest consumer product, retail, and financial companies committed to finding a national solution to divert waste from landfills into the recycling stream in order to be used in the manufacturing supply chain. Closed Loop Fund investors include 3M, Coca-Cola, Colgate-Palmolive, Dr Pepper Snapple, Johnson & Johnson Family of Consumer Companies, Keurig Green Mountain, Nestle Waters North America, PepsiCo and the PepsiCo Foundation, Procter & Gamble, Unilever and the Walmart Foundation. For more information, visit www.closedloopfund.com
