A plantable coffee cup studded with native seeds rewrites the rubbish or recycle dilemma.
The fully compostable cup is a project by a startup company, Reduce.Reuse.Grow, in San Louis Obispo, founded by Alex Henige, a senior at California Polytechnic State University.
It's a US project, so Heinge's vision is that the cup will be studded with seeds for vibrant native Californian wildflowers, like California poppy, desert bluebell and blazing star. But he imagines that the cups will eventually be made based on location, so that each cup contains native seeds from the area it is served in to that every cup will grow and flourish in its native environment, and green up its local urban and deforested areas.
Once consumers finish their drink, they soak the cup in water for five minutes and bury it. The seeds germinate after a few weeks. If the cups do get thrown away, they will compost down to nothing in 180 days.
The project has so far exceeded its goal or raising US$10,000 on Kickstarter. Henige's ultimate plan includes special Reduce.Reuse.Grow bins for those who won't or can't plant their cups. Cups will be picked up from these and planted. He has plans, too, to include tree seeds in further down the track. These would be collected from the bins for managed planting in forests.
What now? Henige plans to use the money the project has raised to develop a commercial prototype that will be priced to compete with other compostable cups on price. He is looking to get his company into a startup accelerator. And he is considering offers made to him by major coffee chains.
