It’s fine if you litter this container, because it just turns into a plant

When you’re ready to throw out this new type of packaging, it shouldn’t go in the recycling bin. Instead, the carton is designed to be planted in your backyard, where legume seeds embedded in the material can start to grow, improving soil health and helping the dirt sequester more carbon from the air. “Recycling is important but costs money, time, and electricity,” says George Bosnas, the Greece-based designer who developed the concept for the Biopack . There are other problems in broken recycling systems : Occasionally, items that are picked up from recycling bins aren’t actually recycled, as in cities that struggled to adapt when China stopped importing low-quality recyclables . When they are recycled, they might be “downcycled” to a lower-grade material. While some startups work on trying to solve those problems, Bosnas saw an opportunity to bypass the recycling system completely. [Photo: courtesy George Bosnas] The package, conceived for a circular economy design competition, is a simple egg carton. Bosnas wanted to focus on a common item that often ends up in the trash. (In Greece, egg cartons are usually made from plastic; in the U.S., where cartons are often made from paper, someone with access to […]

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