London-based Skipping Rocks Lab has just developed the first ever edible water bottle, called “Ooho!” The water bottle is completely biodegradable and its design is modeled after the way in which water is stored in nature; basically in little blobs.
This project, which was funded by an EU sustainability award, has major industrial as well as environmental implications. Imagine a world where a disposable plastic water bottle is a nifty antique instead of a commonplace landfill find.
Photo courtesy of collectively.com
If you are unfamiliar with the fact that the bottled water industry is the biggest scam of the century then you should take a moment and educate yourself. Not only is tap water safer to drink than bottled water, but the production of bottled water causes extreme environmental degradation.
According to Skipping Rocks Lab the aim of Ooho! is, “to provide the convenience of plastic bottles while limiting the environmental impact.” That sounds pretty promising. Ooho! is environmentally friendly because of the way the water is contained. Instead of a plastic bottle, which take millions of gallons of oil to produce, Ooho!’s water is contained in a calcium chloride and algae membrane. And eating said membrane is definitely a safe and generally OK thing to do.
Since Ooho! is biodegradable even if you’d prefer not to eat it, it would still be more environmentally responsible to buy it instead of an old-fashioned plastic water bottle.