KARTORA
Sustainable Single-Use Packaging
Kartora is a biodegradable packaging made from the byproducts of the potato chip industry.
Project Description
Kartora is a single-use packaging designed for potato chip street vendors. It is made from a blend of processed potato peel waste and cellulose fibers, which makes it fully compostable and biodegradable. Kartora advocates the idea of a green future where all packaging is mass-produced from ephemeral, affordable, zero-waste materials and designed in the most ethical way possible.
Potato skins are a valuable source of essential soil nutrients, including potassium, magnesium, and phosphorus. However, the unfortunate reality is that uncomposted potato peels end up as low-value materials like animal feed, fertilizers, or biogas. This results in the wastage of a resource with enormous potential.
Cellulose, the primary structural element of paper, is extracted from wood chips. Modern-day papermaking processes require massive amounts of energy and water, which, in addition to the relatively short service life of paper products, drastically increases paper's carbon footprint. Nevertheless, cellulose fibers are abundant, occur naturally, and play a critical role in sustainable soil development, as affirmed by the North Carolina State University in 2021. That means it is not the material we need to replace—it's the way we process it that needs to change.
Upon recognizing the positive impact of both these materials on soil health and their excellent compatibility, we decided to merge them. The outcome was a novel paper-like material that uses 50% less cellulose than conventional paper and takes roughly one month to decompose. The story, however, doesn't end there, for Kartora is not merely a tangible object—it is a means of popularizing the circular economy model in the street food vending sector, all while contributing to the well-being of our planet.
Features
Some of the product's most prominent features are its dual-purpose top flap and self-closing mechanism. The top flap's semicircular shape makes it perfect for scooping. In other words, there is no need for any sort of scooping utensils. Once the packaging is filled, the flap becomes a lid that can either be torn, in case the user would like to eat the chips hands-free, or closed to keep the chips fresh. The self-closing mechanism works on the principle that the more pressure you apply on the sides of the packaging, the more it opens. When no pressure is applied, the packaging remains closed, which prevents the contents from getting stale and/or spilling.
Kartora is based around the concepts of circularity and user-oriented experience. Contemporary single-use packaging is made from composite materials and petroleum products, such as BOPP and LDPE, that cannot be reused or recycled. Kartora, on the other hand, is made from biodegradable production waste, which is returned to the soil at the end of the product's life cycle.
Kartora is extremely easy to use and dispose of. The packaging comes in the form of flat sheets. It does not require any adhesives and can be folded and assembled in approximately 1 minute. The top flap, as mentioned previously, can be used to scoop the chips and can then be securely closed by inserting the small tuck flap into the slit on the front side, as shown in the third picture. It can also be torn along the perforated fold line for hands-free eating.
Usually, once we are done using single-use packaging, we throw it in a recycling bin, but since Kartora is 100% compostable and biodegradable, it doesn't belong in a regular recycling bin. It can either be discarded in a compost bin or simply shredded and buried in a plant pot, where it would take about 1 month to decompose.
