THE PUZZLE OF PLASTIC

ENVIRONMENTAL ENTREPRENEUR MIRANDA WANG TURNS TO SCIENCE TO SEEK PROFITABLE SOLUTIONS TO THE PROBLEM OF WHAT TO DO WITH OUR MOUNTAINS OF PLASTIC WASTE

- SUSAN NERBERG

To call Miranda Wang an overachiever would be an understatement. At just 26, the Vancouver-born cofounder of BioCellection is making waves in the scientific community as an award-winning innovator and entrepreneur in the environmental sector. Her biotech start-up has already scored a long list of Silicon Valley investors eager to bet on BioCellection’s technology to transform previously unrecyclable plastic waste into profit-making new materials. Can Wang’s quest to unite science, capitalism and environmentalism also save us from ourselves?

Canadian Geographic interviewed Wang in BioCellection’s lab in Menlo Park, California, where she and co-founder Jeanny Yao are working hard to scale up both their company and their technology. “We’re considered an essential service,” says Wang, explaining why her lab has continued to operate throughout the pandemic. So essential, perhaps, that she’s onto something that could one day help shrink the planet’s enormous mountain of plastic pollution.

Susan Nerberg writes about science, the environment, nature and the outdoors — and how humans figure into these pictures. When she’s not collaborating with CanGeo and CanGeo Travel, she contributes to The Globe and Mail, Hakai Magazine, Azure, explore and Broadview, among others.

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