Nearly 10 years ago, I too giggled at the horrendous sound a package of SunChips made in my hands.

It was an exceptionally loud, metallic crinkle. A sound so spectacular and un-chip-bag-like that TV producers made the worlds first 100 per cent compostable chip bag the butt of jokes for weeks.

Introduced in spring 2010, the compostable bag quickly gained more notoriety for its volume than its plant-based material. Its 95-decibel crunches were compared to a running motorcycle engine loud enough to potentially damage your hearing. People created sassy Facebook communities including SORRY BUT I CANT HEAR YOU OVER THIS SUN CHIPS BAG , which still has nearly 40,000 members despite being inactive.

SunChips parent company Frito-Lay had been experimenting with compostable packaging at the time to address concerns about the environment. One former executive, looking through a business lens, framed the problem as branded litter.

Watch the ad campaign before the bags 2010 launch. Story continues below video.

The companys solution was to make a chip bag from more than 90 per cent plant-based polylactic acid, a polymer that used fermented plant starch commonly extracted from corn. Ad campaigns boasted that it could decompose within 14 weeks of being tossed in an active compost pile lifetimes short of the expected 400 years it would take to break down a similar package made from petroleum-based plastic.

It was revolutionary. And it failed spectacularly.

Four years of research had gone into the compostable chip bag. It was a laudable advancement in snack bag technology. But fans of the wavy, square-ish multigrain chip simply couldnt get over how loud it was. It didnt last two years on North American store shelves.

Perhaps the bag was just ahead of its time. With the mainstream arrival of eco-anxiety, a term the American Psychological Association defines as chronic fear of environmental doom , I wanted to find out why the crunchy, compostable experiment didnt work and whether something similar could succeed today.

I think when that SunChips bag came out, it probably hit the market too soon and the consumers and the industry werent ready for it, said Tony Walker, a biologist and assistant professor at Dalhousie Universitys school for resource and environmental studies.

I think now people would be more accepting of the noise because public awareness about the impact of traditional plastics is so negative People are pushing back.

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Frito-Lay, a subsidiary of food and beverage behemoth PepsiCo, was adamant they were on the right side of history.

An important step in our decade-long environmental journey, we believed the trade-off was worth it: a little more noise for a little less waste, according to Frito-Lay Canada spokesperson Sheri Morgan.

Yet customers hated the bags so much that Frito-Lay logged a record number of complaints. The company first responded with a gimmick, offering to mail free ear plugs to crabby customers. Then in early 2011, it tried a new adhesive in hopes it would make the bag quieter. The efforts didnt work, and SunChips sales took a hit.

Watch: Former executive shares a phone call from an angry SunChips customer. Clip starts from 7:44 - 8:30. Story continues below video.

Frito-Lay eventually gave up and discontinued the bags both in the U.S. and Canada by the end of 2011. The company turned its attention inward to less publicly visible initiatives, focusing on making sustainability improvements to its supply chain and production line.

In the end, it wasnt just the noise that sunk the bag, Morgan said. She said household composting was a niche activity at the time and Canadian winters didnt help. Frito-Lay partnered with the Compost Council of Canada to educate consumers, getting them to discard the bag into compost bins and not recycling bins, but some municipal green-bin programs didnt accept the material so the bags ended up in landfills anyway.

Its a problem that continues today. Plastics from plant-based polylactic acid continue to be produced and are commonly found in the form of cups and utensils, sometimes labelled Made from corn. But their increasing presence in stores and restaurants doesnt mean municipalities are better able to process them than a decade ago.

Bio-plastics are chemically different from other plastics. They need to be processed separately and require high heat and moisture to properly break down into organic matter. But if bio-plastics are mixed with traditional plastic items during the recycling process, the batch is considered contaminated. Bio-plastics are commonly branded as compostable, but still show up in general recycling piles, increasing the risk of contamination and additional landfilling.

Watch: How close are we to reinventing plastic? Story continues below video.

The troubles faced by Frito-Lay appear to have scared off any imitators. Just last week, I strolled down the deliciously lengthy chip aisle in a downtown Ottawa grocery store and found nothing made from corn well, aside from the tortilla chips. There must have at least 15 brands of chips, and all of them were sealed in plastic packaging of varying stiffness.

With environmental concerns at an all-time high, I asked Frito-Lay whether they have any plans to resurrect their crinkly, compostable solution.

The experiment we started in 2010 with the SunChips compostable bag continues today, Morgan said, to my surprise. Frito-Lay is developing new biodegradable packaging and has tested the bags with Tostitos in the United States. In Chile and India, the company is testing its new packaging with its Artesanas and Lays brands and paying attention to peoples recycling and composting habits.

Once this research is complete, we will explore bringing this packaging to Canada, she said.

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Theres a lot of snake oil being sold in these eco-anxious times. People are increasingly open to changing small habits for the good of a more sustainable world. Theyre opening their wallets, too. Not knowing better, Ive opted for paper bags instead of plastic for my groceries when given the choice. If you look in my cupboards and drawers, youll find evidence of my eco-guilt in the form of multiple reusable travel cups and produce bags and way too many plastic totes.

My simmering anxiety isnt unique. Ninety per cent of Canadians are worried about plastic pollution, according to an Angus Reid and CBC News survey last year ; 82 per cent said they wanted more government action on the file.

We are really starting to understand the mental health problems that come with climate change: stress, anxiety, depression, loss of belonging, loss of identity, environmental psychologist Dr. Katherine Arbuthnott told me.