Sustainable Products and Packaging | Life Sciences Sustainability | Corning

Sustainable design applies across the full life cycle of a product, from product development to manufacturing, shipping, and end-of-life.

At Corning Life Sciences, we create innovative products and technologies that enable our customers to develop and deliver life-saving therapies. But we recognize our planet’s resources are finite and climate change presents a real and growing concern, so we are reimagining product development. By incorporating Design for Sustainability (DfS) into our processes, we are bringing a more environmentally friendly and diverse mindset to our innovation efforts.

How do we do it?

Sustainable design now for less waste in the future.

Materials

  • Material reduction
  • Renewable and recycled materials
  • Diverse supply chain
  • Sustainable packaging

Process

  • Energy efficiency
  • Renewable energy
  • Water conservation
  • Waste reduction

End-of-Life

  • Design with the end in mind
  • Practice and promote circularity
  • Educate and facilitate reuse or recycling

Corning EcoChoice™

Materials

Corning Cell Culture Flask

Flask Redesign

Our design efforts are not only geared towards innovation, but also minimizing product waste. For example, our 75 cm2 Corning Cell Culture Flask was redesigned to reduce product plastic by 23%. The new rounded shoulders of the flask also allow for easier laboratory usage, making it a win for both scientists and the environment.

Intensification

Intensification

Innovation and intensifying production can help reduce the plastic footprint of laboratory practices for more sustainability, efficiency, and cost savings.

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Corning Media Bottles

Media Bottle Packaging

Corning Media Bottles packaging cases have replaced packing peanuts with recyclable Kraft paper, increasing recycle-ready material in our packaging across 250 product SKUs and avoiding ~2300 cubic feet of packing peanuts going to landfill per year.

Process

Vineland Cooling Tower

Water Recirculation

A water reduction project in Vineland, NJ is projected to save at least 9 million gallons of water annually. Currently, cold water is used to cool water that is too hot to pour down the drain. By installing an air cooler, they are bringing the temperature down quicker and eliminating extra water usage.

Energy Efficiency in Product Production

Energy Efficiency in Product Production

Energy efficiency is part of the Corning culture, and Corning Life Sciences has achieved the ENERGY STAR Challenge for Industry – a > 10% reduction in energy intensity in five years or less -  at least once in 90% of our manufacturing facilities.

Corning Amsterdam Solar Panels

Renewable Energy in Product Production

Thousands of Corning Life Science products are 100% covered by renewable energy through a combination of Renewable Energy Certificates (RECs) from on-site solar, large Corning-sponsored offsite virtual Purchase Power Agreement projects, unbundled market RECs and Guarantees of Origin.

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Corning® Elplasia® 12K Flask

Corning® Elplasia® 12K Flask

“Designing for sustainability means looking at our innovations from conception to launch to see how we can decrease waste and energy use,” said Gail Pentheny, innovation manager, CLS Division Engineering. One example is our Corning Elplasia Flasks, a product for growing spheroids at scale that requires less material and leverages more energy-efficient manufacturing processes compared to standard molding and assembly – and requires less supporting material, such as media needed for spheroid growth, during customer use.

End-of-Life

Sustainable Pallet Program

Sustainable Pallet Program

The Corning Pharmaceutical Technologies Sustainable Pallet Program uses FSC-certified material and minimizes avoidable pallet waste. About 40% of the pallets are returned each month to be reused 4-8 times, depending on pallet type and specification.

Glass Reuse

Glass Reuse

Glass reuse is an important part of the manufacturing process at Corning’s Vineland, NJ plant. Glass tubing produced in Vineland contains 20-30% post-industrial recycled glass cullet.

Corning Roller Bottles

Roller Bottles

Typically, roller bottles are produced using ink to mark the volume on the bottles, making the product ineligible for recycling. Graduations on Corning Polystyrene Roller Bottles are now laser etched, making over 35 metric tons of plastic to be recycled. That’s the same weight as a fully loaded 18-wheeler truck.