Here’s a staggering fact for you; the Taiwanese population of 23 million use 1.5 billion plastic beverage cups a year. That’s 65 cups a year each!
Though one of the biggest Great White’s ever caught was in Taiwan it is the plastic menaces that are a bigger scourge of this small island’s coastline - 70% of the waste washed up on the nation’s shores in 2011 were plastic cups and their partners in crime the lids. So what are they doing about it?
As the Taiwanese/Chinese Government struggle to impose sanctions on the fast food and beverage outlets that give the cups away so freely, one design agency have taken it upon themselves to not only make people aware of the problem but highlight how the cups can be recycled before their very eyes.
Fabraft Design Lab have developed a concept tricycle called Mobile Fab. The trike is touring round Taipei singling out those about to dispose of a plastic cup and turn their plastic cup into a gear shaped bike spoke decoration in front of their eyes.
On the front of the trike is a shredder, which turns the cup into a sort of plastic powder, which in turn is placed into a filament extrusion device and then into a 3D printer where their plastic cup is transformed before their very eyes. Though the trike is pedal powered the RepRap and recycling
The design agency not only wants to highlight the plastic peril but to demystify the ideas of 3D printing to the Taiwanese public. The Taiwanese recently woke up to the possibilities of 3D Printing by the conglomerate electronic company Kinpo Group launching their own 3D Printer through their offshoot XYZ Printing.
Taipei is the World Design Capital in 2016 and with ideas like this we’re sure that Fabraft Design Lab will be at the forefront of this exciting cultural event but with 1.5 billion cups to start recycling, one thing’s for sure, they’re gonna need a bigger trike…
