Barnett ’15 tackles single-use plastics and more

Michaela Barnett, a 2015 Furman University sustainability science and Spanish alumna, was featured in The Ledger about her efforts to curb single-use plastics in the Knoxville, Tennessee, region. In 2021, Barnett established KnoxFill, a cleverly named company that refills sanitized containers with all manner of products such as hand soap, shampoo and household cleaners, so the used plastic vessels don’t end up in the waste stream or the ocean. The refillery also serves to reduce the amount water, energy and materials used in making new plastic containers. Toward the end of her Ph.D. studies at the University of Virginia, Barnett started the company in a spare room of her house.

She is currently completing a yearlong Congressional Science & Technology Policy Fellowship with the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Washington, D.C. where she is learning about sustainability efforts at the broader policy level. “I’m a scientist-turned-small-business owner, now turned science policy nerd,” she said in the front-page story of The Ledger.

See a related Furman News story here.