Products from the Earthshot Prize winner are utilized at Aston Villa, due to fan William

The West Midlands team that the Prince of Wales supports is testing out cartons made by the environmentally friendly packaging manufacturer Notpla.

Thanks to supporter the Prince of Wales, the Earthshot Prize winner’s products are being used to serve food at Aston Villa Football Club on match days.

William played a key role in assisting sustainable packaging startup Notpla test its cartons at the West Midlands club he sponsors. William launched the prize to recognize and scale-up solutions to help “repair” the earth.

The prince will attend the 2023 Earthshot Prize presentation in Singapore next month, as well as a symposium organized by William’s umbrella organization United for Wildlife to combat the illegal trade in animal parts.

Pie and mash, burgers, and hotdogs have been served in cardboard containers with a seaweed-derived coating that allows cartons to be recycled since the start of Aston Villa’s season. Trials have also been conducted at rival Premier League team Tottenham.

He established a connection between us and made it happen.

William’s contribution to the trial at Villa was described as follows by Pierre Paslier, co-founder and CEO of Notpla, which in 2022 won the Build a Waste-Free World Earthshot category: “He connected us, he made that connection happen.”

He referred to Tottenham and Villa as “two very first, significant trials that brought us to the attention of the catering companies that we could actually do something about reducing their production of plastic waste.”

“That’s been really exciting, to have a chance to sit at the table and present for what we do. Now what’s really exciting is how we turn those three, four stadiums into forty, fifty, and this is what we’re hopefully announcing in the coming quarter.”

The Earthshot Prize is an ambitious project that annually awards five category winners with £1 million each to build up their environmental ideas. William conducted his inaugural Earthshot Prize awards ceremony at London’s Alexandra Palace in 2021, with Boston serving as the event’s host the year before.

The 2023 finalists include Sea Forest of Australia and ENSO of Britain, both of which have produced livestock feeds based on seaweed to cut down on methane emissions from sheep and calves. ENSO, a British firm, has developed a more effective electric car tire that sheds less particles.