Hexacomb, a Boise Inc. company, offers honeycomb packaging made from SFI-sourced renewable wood fibers. The company donated several hundred sheets of their honeycomb protective paper-based packaging to the museum for the ocean exhibit. It’s tough stuff, this honeycomb,  used for transporting heavy products (like appliances and furniture) which also makes it ideal for artistic structures.

The exhibit will be constantly changing, since participants are invited to add their own recyclable sea creatures and plants. Exhibition-goers can make and ad seahorses, manta rays, octopi, plants–whatever strikes their fancy. If an artist ends up feeling attached to their creation, participants are welcome to take sustainable packaging masterpieces home. Go ahead and laugh, but cardboard art can be pretty spectacular!

The Recycle Reef exhibit is designed to raise awareness about recycling, and when the exhibit closes on August 25, all of the honeycomb will be recycled.

The Waste Management-McDonough Sustainable Innovation Collaborative intends to tackle product and packaging waste, beginning with the design phase. This way, the end of the pipeline can communicate back, and inform the suppliers how to improve complex and unrecyclable packages. Theoretically, every package should be reusable.

For years, Waste Management CEO David Steiner has envisioned mining waste from the landfill to put products back into the supply chain. This could mean big savings for waste management companies, manufacturers, and the environment. Steiner once claimed that this innovative idea (“mining the landfill”) would be a sweeping change in the industry. Now, he says, it seems more likely to be a creeping change.

Still, the partnership is a promising step in the right direction, backed by optimism and big names. The collaboration was born at Fortune Brainstorm Green, where participants examined the question: “How do we double America’s recycling rate in five years?” McDonough and Steiner began to discuss the gap between the beginning and the end of the supply chain.

Together, they will work as a consulting team, helping companies tackle toxic packaging, and improve sustainability by “designing up from the dumpster.”

That’s why a dedicated group of National Park officials are trying to ban the sale of bottled water in parks across the country. But there have been some hiccups. Agency documents indicate that Yellowstone, Grand Teton, Death Valley, and several other National Parks planned to ban the sale of bottled water several years ago. But Coca-Cola stepped in. Coca-Cola dominates the bottled water market at many of our National Parks. The company also gives substantial contributions to the National Park Foundation, the fund-raising arm for NPS. It’s no surprise that NPS Director Jon Jarvis intervened to impede the ban, siding with Coca-Cola.

It’s no use pointing fingers: NPS needs the donations, and Coca-Cola is a business like any other. They are profit-driven. Coca-Cola does some really good deeds, too, like sending AidPods (with diarrhea medicine) to sub-Saharan Africa. But bottled water in National Parks is yucky. Disposable plastic water water bottles make up 20% of the Grand Canyon’s waste stream! Animals sometimes chew up the plastic too.

So, here’s the good news: the Grand Canyon (whose bottled water came from Xanterra, not Coca-Cola) actually did successfully ban bottled water several years ago. So did Zion, Hawaii Volcanoes, Petrified Forest, and Timpanogos Cave, all following in the footsteps of universities and brave municipal towns such as Concord, Massachusetts. These National Parks carefully planned the transition, creating public water facilities and making sure there are plenty of reusable souvenir bottles for sale. It’s likely only a matter of time before other parks follow their lead, with or without Coke’s support.

It’s weird. On the other hand, it’s a sustainable side of Apple. After all, “box fetishists” are essentially recycling the boxes. Plus, compared to many electronic companies, Apple uses small boxes. And, over the past few years, they made them smaller, and smaller.

Here are some other pluses on their sustainability scorecard: Apple uses PaperFoam trays (made from potato starch) for much of their packaging. The itty-bitty headphone case that comes with new iPods is made of renewable tapioca paper foam, and it dissolves in water.  On Apple’s website, they offer an in-depth green spiel, regarding recycling efforts, renewable energy, their environmental footprint, and so on.

Beyond the marketing, it is difficult to discern whether or not Apple’s packaging is any more sustainable than other companies. Many environmental groups have pointed an evil finger at Apple, and later admitted that it’s because the company is an industry leader. No doubt I.B.M., Nokia, Sony, and others have similar ethical and environmental issues. In a nutshell: Apple is not perfect, and in terms of sustainability, the company does not stand apart from competitors.

Still, it’s hard to frown at a package that’s so loved, people will pay for an empty box.

ColaLife, a non-profit UK agency founded to leverage Coca-Cola, partnered with pi global, and created a solution: AidPod. AidPod is the name of the distribution packaging system: tucked neatly into the unused space between Coca-Cola bottles, ColaLife places self-contained, structured packages with anti-diarrheal kits. Diarrhea? It is the second biggest killer of children under five in sub-Saharan Africa.

Each Kit Yamoyo (“kit of life”) is packaged with a strong heat-sealed film to prevent contamination. The kits contain hand soap, Zinc tablets and a sachet of Oral Rehydration Salts. The salts can be mixed with water in the AidPod vessel, which also serves as a hygienic, reusable cup.

ColaLife’s AidPod won the 2013 Diamond Award from DuPont Packaging. The AidPod was also selected by The Design Museum as Product Design of the Year 2013 (the so-called “Oscars of the Design World”). It’s no wonder that the design is getting attention: these unique, life-saving pods are tucked into otherwise unused packaging space.

If successful, the ColaLife Operational Trial Zambia (Cotz), could be used around the world for various medical kits. Meanwhile, international companies are watching and wondering–how else can clever packaging change the world?