If you run in a race in London in the near future and pass a hydration station, you may be handed a small, bubble-like sphere of water instead of a bottle. The gelatinous packaging, called the聽Ooho, is compostable鈥搊r even edible, if you want to swallow it. And after two years of development, its designers are ready to bring it to market. Three London-based design students first created a聽prototype of the edible bottle in 2014 as an聽alternative to plastic bottles.
The idea gained internet hype (though also some scorn for a hilarious聽video that made the early prototypes look fairly impossible to use without soaking yourself). The problem it was designed to solve鈥搕he number of disposable bottles in landfills鈥搆eeps growing. In the U.K. alone, around聽16 million are trashed each day; another 19 million are recycled, but still have the environmental footprint of a product made from oil. In the U.S., recycling rates are聽even lower. The company hopes it can put a dent in that number by replacing聽the growing number of small bottles that are consumed on the go. Roughly a third of water bottles sold are a half-liter or less. Evian launched a聽200-milliliter bottle, which can鈥檛 be resealed, in 2016.
The new packaging is based on the culinary technique of聽spherification,聽which is also used to make fake caviar and the tiny juice balls added to boba tea. Dip a ball of ice in calcium chloride and brown algae extract, and you can form a spherical membrane that keeps holding the ice as it melts and returns to room temperature.
Because the membrane is made from food ingredients, you can eat it instead of throwing it away. The Jell-O-like packaging doesn鈥檛 have a natural taste, but it鈥檚 possible to add flavors to make it more appetizing.
The package doesn鈥檛 have to be eaten every time, since it鈥檚 also compostable. 鈥淲hen people try it for the first time, they want to eat it because it鈥檚 part of the experience,鈥� says Pierre Paslier, cofounder of聽Skipping Rocks Lab, the startup developing the packaging. 鈥淭hen it will be just like the peel of a fruit. You鈥檙e not expected to eat the peel of your orange or banana. We are trying to follow the example set by nature for packaging.鈥�
The outer layer of the package is always meant to be peeled like fruit鈥搊ne thin outer layer of the membrane peels away to keep the inner layer clean and can then be composted. (While compostable cups are an alternative solution, many can only be composted in industrial facilities; the Ooho can be tossed on a simple home compost pile, where it will decompose within weeks).
The company is targeting both outdoor events and cafes. 鈥淲here we see a lot of potential for Ooho is outdoor events鈥揻estivals, marathons, places where basically there are a lot of people consuming packaging over a very short amount of time,鈥� says Paslier.
Of course, that鈥檚 assuming that people embrace the idea of drinking from a squishy, jellyfish-like blob. The designers say that people have embraced the novelty in tests. And in some parts of the world, such as sub-Saharan Africa, consumers have embraced similar (but trash-producing)聽plastic water sachets.
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