As the world teeters on the brink of suffocating from single-use products, some designers are quickly coming up with ingenious ways to reduce our waste. For example, Greek designer George Bosnas has just unveiled the Biopack, a compact egg carton made out of cleared paper pulp, flour, starch and biological legume seeds. Instead of throwing out the eco-friendly container at the end of its use, it can be planted directly into the ground to sprout green plants.
According to Bosnas, the inspiration behind the Biopack came from the conundrum that recycling presents. Although communities and citizens around the world are trying to reap the benefits of recycling, the actual process is quite complicated, expensive and usually not as eco-friendly as one would think. An arduous task from start to finish, true recycling involves loads of organization, including transportation, sorting, processing and converting materials into new goods to be, once again, transported back into the market.
With this in mind, the truest, most ecological form of recycling is to take a single-use product and naturally turn it into something ecologically beneficial for the environment. Enter the innovative Biopack — a simple box that holds up to four eggs. Made out of cleared paper pulp, flour, starch and seeds, the sustainable packaging is quite dense to protect the eggs from breaking.
Once the eggs are used, instead of throwing away the box or shipping it off to be recycled, the entire egg carton can be planted into soil. With a little watering, the bio-packaging breaks down naturally, leaving the seeds to sprout into green plants, which takes approximately 30 days.
Not only does the sustainable packaging create a full-cycle system that turns a product into a plant, but according to Bosnas, growing legumes actually increases soil fertility. A win-win for the world!
This egg carton is made out of seeds that sprout when replanted [Inhabitat]