sponsored by brilliant
as revolutionary as plastics were for
changing the course of manufacturing
forever it's become a major burden on
the world with 91 of plastics not being
recycled and each of us consuming five
grams of micro plastic every single week
there has to be a better solution in a
previous video i covered how fungus may
be a viable plastic replacement for the
future but there's another solution
starting to bloom
algae
and it's showing up in a place you might
not expect
your feet
what if i told you we could wear plastic
free flip-flops and shoes made from
algae
i met farrell welcome to undecided
[Music]
algae seems to be proliferating in a
number of fields from biofuels
production to carbon capture but the
algal tide is tiptoeing towards a new
fashion trend sustainable footwear
flip-flops are endemic and contain
non-recyclable plastic their production
fuels climate change and ocean pollution
but we could soon be wearing
plastic-free flip-flops made from algae
let's start from the roots broadly
speaking algae are aquatic organisms
that perform photosynthesis and unlike
land plants their structure is much
simpler for instance they have no roots
stems or leaves in some cases you can
find them both in fresh water typically
lakes as well as seawater based on their
size you can distinguish between
microalgae or phytoplankton and
macroalgae which is also known as
seaweed like giant kelp
but what's so special about algae well
their secret lies in their oily content
that can perform as well as petroleum
oil over the last two decades
researchers have been exploring the
potential of algae as a sustainable
feedstock for making biofuels
they focused on extracting the algae oil
containing components to replace
petroleum-derived oil
however to upscale the technology you
need a massive amount of resources it
would take 50 of yearly fertilizers used
in european crop production to meet just
10 percent of european transport fuel
demand that's why biotech startups are
now diving into a new ocean of
applications offered by the marine plant
like c combinator tackling the sargassum
algal blooms in the caribbean sea the
puerto rico based company is harvesting
the surplus toxic algae to make useful
products their extraction process
upscales this type of brown seaweed into
more sustainable alternatives for
agricultural cosmetic and textiles
industries the fashion world is one of
the main drivers of plastic pollution 35
of all microplastics that flush into the
ocean come from washing our synthetic
clothing
and believe it or not polyester is in 60
of what we wear which sounds kind of
crazy but just check the labels in your
t-shirts and you'll see
polyester is a petroleum derived fiber
in other words it's plastic it takes
over 200 years to decompose and drinks
up about 70 million barrels of oil each
year
now what about your shoes polyester is
one of the staple textiles in our
footwear design on average shoe
production releases 450 billion pounds
of co2 every single year with a very low
price flip flops became the world's
best-selling shoe so you can see why
these sandals are responsible for a
massive share of shoes carbon footprint
on top of that flip flops are typically
made from an ethylene vinyl acetate or
eva based foam
while many eva may be recycled many flip
flops contain non-recyclable polymers
like pvc and polyurethane that means
they'll be kicking around in a landfill
for a hundred years like in ethiopia
which is one of the top consumers of
flip flops from there they walk their
way to the ocean according to the
conservation and recycling group ocean
soul
90 tons of flip-flops are discarded each
year along the beaches of east africa
alone
last year some researchers picked up 25
tons of trash along the beaches of
aldabra the world's second largest coral
atoll it's just off the east african
coast around a quarter of that trash was
flip flops so can we use algae to wipe
away the plastic stains of our footwear
well looks like we can the munjoy
startup designed all day a four in one
pair of shoes entirely made of plants
playing around with this flexible
footwear you can shape it into four
different types of shoes sneakers during
the day a slide or a mule at night or a
sandal on the beach
it's pretty cool
but the interesting thing is that the
bottom of the world's most versatile
shoe is made of bloom foam it's a mix of
algae waste and sugarcane as an
alternative to the traditional
petroleum-based eva foam
so why algae
besides growing 10 times faster than
terrestrial plants algae cultivation
requires less than 10 of the land
also algae consumes less water than land
crops researchers from the university of
california are growing microalgae in
man-made ponds once fully developed they
separate the plants from water to obtain
a sort of green pesto or more like paste
they then extract the oily fraction out
of the paste and turn it into a biofoam
to make flip-flops
but how does it work well using a
machine in their lab they pour a slimy
oil onto a mold by applying heat the
algae oil is baked into a vegan cake a
solid foam which takes the shape of the
flip-flop components including the
footbed and the outer sole
after about 10 minutes you open the mold
peel off the pieces and put them
together to create a renewable sandal
with a bio content of 52
this eco-friendly beachwear fully
biodegrades within six months in a
compost pile and even if they end up in
the ocean the algae-based flip-flops
will disappear in a year which is
obviously way quicker than petroleum
oil-based footwear but can this be
upscaled or is it just a flop well on
the heel of their studies the scientist
group founded el genesis materials to
give it a go the company is working with
a number of footwear brands to launch
their soft foams on the market as
mentioned on their website reef will be
their first official partner for
commercial manufacturing of their
flip-flops this should happen within a
year or so halogenesis solar technology
could have a massive impact on climate
change and the shoe industry not only do
fossil fuels stay in the ground but
algae also capture co2 while growing
sounds great right
but lgenesis has an achilles heel at the
moment they can't buy enough algae to
support their production lgenesis
founders believe the supply will grow as
more algae farmers enter the market and
this may happen soon thanks to the
support of the u.s department of
agriculture the 2018 farm bill gave
farmers resources to put in place newer
and more efficient ways of harvesting
algal biomass but algenisis isn't the
only one working on algae-based footwear
back in 2016 the us-based company bloom
created the world's first algae blended
eva on the market which should sound
familiar because it's the same foam used
by the munjoishu transformer that i
mentioned earlier
with a renewable content of at least 45
their bloom foam which is now known as
ryze replaced shu's plastic soles
partnering with the london-based
vivobarefoot brand they made a splash
with the launch of the ultra 3 water
shoe unlike el genesis bloom doesn't
farm their algae in house as they
repurpose them from waterways that are
affected by algal excessive
proliferation like the mississippi river
deforestation intensive agriculture and
wastewater treatment are feeding our
water bodies with a nutrient banquet
perfect for algae to feast on and bloom
wildly this leads to harmful
consequences such as oxygen depletion
and sunlight blocking which causes the
death of wildlife as well as potentially
drinking water pollution
blue embarked on an eco-crusade around
the world these good pirates are after a
green treasure and not just dollars but
algae along the line of what c
combinator does their work is flipping a
problem into a solution the norwegian
company dynaspace has developed a
machine learning algorithm that can
detect algal blooms through satellite
imagery but how does bloom's machine
work well it's got a giant vacuum that
sucks up algae while a screen prevents
fish and wildlife from getting caught
they then skim off the water from the
plants through a continuous solar drying
process the system filters 175 gallons
of algae polluted water per minute for a
total recovery of about 300 pounds of
plants in a day
while recirculating the filtered water
back into the environment the dried
algae are first pulverized and then made
into pellets these are injected into a
mold to create a biofoam for each pair
of ultra 3 sneakers bloom cleans up
about 57 gallons of water and saves 40
balloons worth of co2
now that's what i call a climate
friendly party now bloom's algae
enriched eva foam was used to design the
native shoes sneakers in 2019 the
canadian brand touts to be the first and
only to incorporate this material into
the whole footwear design including the
upper midsole and outsole
also through their remix project you can
recycle their shoes they regrind the
footwear materials and repurpose them
for seating playground flooring and
insulation
while still not entirely bio-based algae
are slowly sneaking into sneakers and
flip-flops so how do algae-based shoes
stack up in terms of cost compared to
traditional footwear algenis touted a
projected cost of about three dollars
per pair which would be comparable to
other commercial flip-flops as for
bloom's shoes the rough estimate is that
their cost is still slightly higher than
100 percent eva footwear but this is
expected to drop as the process gets
more efficient apparently bloom created
100 biodegradable foams with high algae
content in the lab but their viability
is still miles away from mass-market
adoption as of today the main burden
anchoring the algae shoes to the lab
bench seems to be the raw material
production
based on a comprehensive study published
last year we still need further
development to make microalgae derive
bioplastic manufacturer competitive at a
commercial scale
on the other hand some cash flow should
sink the algae costs down as the
technology improves over the years for
instance in 2020 the us department of
energy invested a total of 27 million
dollars in r d projects to ditch plastic
for good intel genesis received part of
this fund developed their algae-based
bioplastic but is it really worth
surfing this algal wave from an economic
standpoint well the market for algae
products is expected to grow at a rate
about 6.3 percent from 2020 to 2027
reaching a value of nearly one billion
dollars and the demand for bioplastics
seems to be one of the drivers for this
organic growth
algae has the chance to be the oil of
the future while biofuels are still far
from commercial application the shoe
industry seems to be a step ahead of
harnessing the potential for this green
material
although the more eco-friendly foams are
still not 100 algae-based companies may
be on the right path to completely kick
plastic out of our footwear
now if you're interested in learning
more about the principles behind algae
and the chemistry that's behind all of
this i'd strongly recommend checking out
the chemical reaction course at
brilliant just like making those flip
flops you'll dive into how matter
transforms from one thing into another
we don't have to just rely on the
materials we find in nature but we can
make our own it's a fun one that really
helped me wrap my head around a lot of
this but even if there's no chemistry
between you and that topic
sometimes it's okay to just be friends
they have over 60 courses including
topics in computer science quantum
mechanics and mathematics they've got
something for everybody all of the
concepts are taught through fun and
interactive challenges and really help
you to understand the why of something
not just the how it helps develop your
intuition which is my favorite part
about brilliant and taps into the way i
learn and it just makes it fun
go to brilliant.org undecided to sign up
for free the first 200 people will get
20 off their annual premium membership
thanks to brilliant and to all of you
for supporting the channel so what do
you think would you want to wear a pair
of algae-based shoes or flip-flops
crocs
i mean who doesn't like a nice pair of
crocs
jump in the comments and let me know
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the next one