London (CNN Business) Thirsty while running? Here, have a seaweed ball full of sports drink.
More than 41,000 people will run the London Marathon on Sunday. When they reach mile 23, they'll be handed edible pods made of seaweed extracts instead of a plastic water bottle.
It's one way race organizers are hoping to reduce the huge amount of plastic waste generated during the endurance run. They want to cut the number of plastic bottles used by 200,000.
Our goal is to make plastic packaging disappear." Rodrigo García González and Pierre-Yves Paslier
The Ooho seaweed capsules are made by a London-based startup called Skipping Rocks Lab.
They can be cheaper to produce than plastic and the thin membrane that forms the pod is edible and tasteless.
o2bonh2o on April 27th, 2019 at 22:25 UTC »
This is what it looks like...https://www.extremetech.com/extreme/247672-seaweed-based-water-pouch-aims-end-need-plastic-bottles
BrunoMarx on April 27th, 2019 at 21:57 UTC »
I ran a half marathon last month that was organised by the same people who organise the London Marathon and they had the same edible pods. They were pretty good although I opted to spit out the pod after I finished the liquid inside. The amount was just about right too since its possible to overhydrate during a race.
JorritJ on April 27th, 2019 at 21:35 UTC »
Wow, the numbers in the article are staggering!
According to a 2017 study published in the journal Science Advances, only 9% of 8,300 million metric tons of plastic ever produced has been recycled. Another 12% has been burnt in incinerators.
The remaining 79% has been sent to landfills, improperly discarded or found its way into the oceans.
Producing plastic bottles also requires a lot of energy and water. It takes more than five liters of water to produce a standard 500 ml plastic bottle, according to advocacy group Water Footprint Network.
This makes me very, very sad!