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And that’s basically it!
The move to black and white was forced on Calbee by disrupted supplies of naptha, an ink ingredient derived from petroleum.
So the bright colours we see on shelves involve fossil fuels too. The dystopia knows no limits.
Genuinely so many things come from oil, and a lot of them are dyes. Also some antibiotics, and various other useful chemicals.
But yeah, a surprising number of dyes come from oil, and its actually a waste product of refinement. It’s a good thing overall with our current gas dependency, but its a fragile system when oil is one of the most sought-after finite-supply things on earth.
cap, that's a marketing move. black ink still needs solvent and amount of it saved by using one pass instead of 3 is tiny, transport will take more
The pigments are all petroleum based as well. Which I'm guessing there's no shortage of yet, the prices are just being increased in real time in response to the petroleum economy. You can get rid of the colors and still sell. You can't sell if you can't distribute, so getting rid of transport isn't an option.
pigments are the least problem, and many are not dependent on oil, like titania. some might, like soot, but because we're talking about japan, it's likely they get it from chinese manufacturer, and chinese chemical industry relies on coal heavily. but it's such a small part of it all, binder, solvent and the entire packaging are likely petroleum-derived or dependent so there's close to zero savings here. not to mention fuel and fertilizer use in farming that led to that product
it's such unbelievably petty corner cutting, the only value of it is in marketing
you know what would help them? switch to solar process heat, best time for it was decade ago, second best time is now (they're using heavy fuel oil for heating something)
'Forces' meaning they cannot accept earning $0.02 per package less.
Japanese markets are extremely sensitive to price changes and food price margins are razor thin. An ice cream company once publicly apologized for raising their prices by 10 yen (~$0.10 USD) after years of keeping its price at 60 yen (~$0.60 USD).