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Peel Saver

Potatoes Held by Potatoes – Paolo Stefano Gentile’s concept revolves around employing this material for crafting street food packaging. The potato peel contains starches and fiber components, which, through maceration and natural drying, gain the capacity to bond and solidify. This resulting material is entirely derived from food production waste and is fully biodegradable. Once the packaging fulfills its[...]

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3D Printing With Coffee Grounds

Coffee Grounds as a 3D Printing Material – Millions of tons of coffee grounds are generated annually globally. With the growing interest of upcycling and reusing the bi-product, numerous innovative concepts and projects have been in research. Michael Rivera and his team have developed a process on how to recover spent coffee grounds from local coffee shops and convert them into a material[...]

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Coffee Biochar Concrete

Coffee Grounds as a Concrete Foundation – The motivation behind the Australian based research was the large amount of organic waste ending up in landfills and contributing to high greenhouse gas emissions. In Australia, about 6.87 million tonnes of organic waste ends up in landfills and contributes to 3% of Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions. The research group was discussing about shifting[...]

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Zero economy meal tray

Packaging concept for flight catering – As part of the research project “Get Onboard: Reduce. Reuse. Rethink.” developed solutions for the waste generated by air travel – as much as 5.7 million tons of cabin waste per year. The results of the agency, which specializes in the transport sector, were presented in 2019. The solutions developed focus on in-flight catering.[...]

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Zero Takeaway Packaging

Takeaway concept – London-based design studio PriestmanGoode’s new concepts show how it is possible to reduce the huge amounts of plastic packaging used in takeaway food deliveries. The project is the latest in a series of concepts the studio has developed to show how design thinking can help address some of the big problems of everyday life[...]

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Chitosan Bioplastics

Material from shrimp shells – The biodegradable material “Chitosan Bioplastics” was created as a research project by Paul Kheem and Ronny Haberer. In order to reduce global marine pollution, they use the chitin found in shrimp shells to develop a plastic alternative from it. Acetylation of the biopolymer yields chitosan, which, as a bioplastic, is the starting point of[...]

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MILK MaterialLab ChitosanBioplastics PaulKheem

Shellworks Vivomer

Bioplastic From Lobster Shells – Shellworks makes a sustainable bioplastic from discarded lobster shells. Four designers, Ed Jones, Insiya Jafferjee, Amir Afshar and Andrew Edwards of the Royal College of Art and Imperial College, developed several machines that produce the paper-like material from marine debris. The chitin contained in the shells is a fibrous biopolymer, which is obtained by[...]

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Gone

Compostable disposable packaging – As a result of the environmental impact following sporting events, Lizzie Wright developed the concept of “Gone.” She was looking for a solution that would replace the plastic packaging of energy gels while being biodegradable. After consumption, athletes can throw “Gone” on the street or in nature without polluting it. The material, which consists[...]

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LAVAZZA Cookie Cup

Cookie dough coffee cup – In 2003, Italian designer Enrique Sardi created a coffee cup for LAVAZZA, which consists of a pastry dough and special powdered sugar. The edible cookie cup can be eaten after enjoying the coffee and therefore does not produce any waste. LAVAZZA became a pioneer with this idea and has since inspired a wide variety[...]

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Banka

Packing With Shelf Life Indicator – Alexander Cherkasov’s concept aims to preserve the shelf life of, for example, pickles, tomatoes or cabbage, and to alert the consumer to a harmful development of the product by means of a discolored reaction surface. Once the deterioration of the food has occurred, the surface of the bag turns gray and disposal is inevitable.[...]

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MILK MaterialLab banka packaging Alexander Cherkasov

Agar Plasticity

Packing based on seaweed – “Agar Plasticity” is a materials research project exploring agar as an alternative to synthetic plastics. The project was awarded in the category ,ANTICIPATION’ at the Lexus Design Award 2016. Food packaging creates a lot of unnecessary waste. Agar is a traditional Japanese food that is often used to make sweets. However, it is also[...]

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Styrofoam decomposing mealworms

Plastic-eating organisms – While mealworms normally feed on wheat bran, biologists at Stanford University and Peking University have given them polystyrene – a form of plastic foam – instead. Mostly, this material is used for polystyrene packaging, yogurt pots or cable insulation. In a test trial, the worms ate the material completely – about 40 mg per[...]

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