Saving the Planet with Foldable Containers

Have you ever heard of a foldable shipping container? Seems impossible, right? Well, a Dutch company, 4FOLD, just announced recently that they have developed a folding shipping container that will help make the world a bit more efficient and sustainable.

According to 4Fold, the design of the container is a simple yet efficient design, helping to create more room on vessels, docks, trains, and trucks. By saving more space, this results in up to 37% CO₂ emissions and cost on vessels, on road transport, in terminals and on depots.

Just 10 minutes and the container can be folded down to a quarter of its size. The one interconnected bundle can then be handled like one container.

Staxxon is another company that had made a foldable container that can be folded on the top and bottom, under 10 minutes as well. They have received Container Safety Convention (CSC) certification for their 20’ container and now currently accepting pre-orders. This allows their container to be shipped oversea as a regular standard container.

“These benefits saw Jim Hagemann Snabe, chairman of the world’s largest shipping line, A.P. Moller-Maersk A/S, refer to foldable containers as the “dream of the shipping industry” last year. At the same time, consumer-goods producers including Procter & Gamble Co. are also testing the technology.” We hoped that one day the 4FOLD container would be approved as well.”

So far, we only know what 4FOLD and Staxxon have shared so far. We want to know if it is as strong as a regular container and if it can withstand the weather at sea. What are your thoughts on it? Is this the future of shipping containers? Can we successfully ship our products and not only save space, time, and money, but also our planet?