Green Baby Steps: Cup Noodle's Refill
by Collin Dunn, Corvallis, OR, USA 
on 01. 4.08
Disposable, single-serving bowls of noodles don't fit many (okay, any) TreeHugger values of minimizing packaging waste or resource efficiency. The ubiquitous "Cup Noodles," dietary staple of many a college student and lunch on the go, have taken a green baby step by offering reusable, refillable cups for their noodle soups.
Customers in Japan can buy the "Cup Noodle Refill Starter Pack," which includes a refill for Cup Noodle, a refill for Seafood Noodle, and an original cup exclusively for refill dubbed "My Noodle Cup." The product is the first of an environment friendly product series to be released by the company under the slogan "Enjoy eating in an eco-friendly style."
Though the gimmicky marketing borders on greenwashing -- the refillable cups are definitely "greener" rather than out and out "green" -- this is certainly a step in the right direction for a pretty wasteful product. Plus, the refills are kinda fun -- you can design and print your own cup liner (pictured below the fold) -- and allowing for this increased creativity might help push the green aspect to people who just want to eat instant noodles, and don't care about throwing away a polystyrene cup and plastic wrapping at every meal. Either way, it's greener than before, and that's something that always deserves attention. Read up on the history of the instant noodle and learn more about the refill cup at ::Japan for Sustainability via ::NotCot and ::Cup Noodle's Refill minisite (in Japanese)
Update: Thanks to eagle-eyed TreeHugger Lloyd, there are now more pics of the (rather excessively-packaged) refillable cup and the refills themselves, after the jump.
The whole shebang.
"Design your own" interface
"Design your own" cup; someone's gone a little overboard
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I am a little bit disturbed about this.
I would first of all like to say cup noodles are bad, why?
Because, the NOODLES are harmless pieces of noodle.. to be frank, but the substance that you pour into your steaming bowl of noodles is toxic.
"MSG ecause MSG is absorbed very quickly in the gastrointestinal tract (unlike glutamic acid-containing proteins in foods), MSG could spike blood plasma levels of glutamate.[9][10][11] Glutamic acid is in a class of chemicals known as excitotoxins, high levels of which have been shown in animal studies to cause damage to areas of the brain unprotected by the blood-brain barrier and that a variety of chronic diseases can arise out of this neurotoxicity.[12][13]"
yeah, well to sum that up - msg is a neurotoxin
lemme define THAT for you
"Neurotoxicity occurs when the exposure to natural or manmade toxic substances, which are called neurotoxins, alters the normal activity of the nervous system. "
yeah, it alters the nervous system, that thing that tells your left finger to move and your right eyelid to blink.
I AM SORRY for a long and ugly post, but while we are at it i do not feel that treehugger should be promoting un natural toxic substances.
it may just be my opinion but i feel that people are unaware of the poisons in that little pouch that they add to their noodles.
Cup Noodle should just go all the way and make a ceramic mug that would be reusable and easy to clean.
"Because, the NOODLES are harmless pieces of noodle.. to be frank, but the substance that you pour into your steaming bowl of noodles is toxic. "
Sorry for the late comment, but the noodles already have the MSG all over them when you buy it. You kinda just pour water on Cup Noodles, so what you're saying here is that water = toxic.. @_@