Sustainable design studio launches Kickstarter campaign for portable charger

Made from 100 per cent non-recyclable plastic waste its power comes from repurposed batteries saved from going to landfill.

A Kickstarter campaign for the project was set up with a target of £4,000.

Tom Meades, sustainable designer and manager at Gomi, said: "We were fully funded in just three hours and now are over 500 per cent funded so we're really pleased."

The current total is nearly £22,000.

The design studio originally won £10,000 from the Environment Now Programme in January 2018 which it used for its first sustainable innovation the Gomi Speakers.

Now, their aim is to scale-up and introduce their consumer electronic products made from waste materials that are otherwise destined for landfill, to the mass global market - at an affordable price of under £40 each.

Plastic waste makes up 85 per cent of the pollution on our beaches around the world, and every year the UK alone throws away 1.2 billion kilos of flexible plastics. Worldwide, 150 billion kilos of flexible plastics are produced every year. Flexible plastic (LDPE) consists of plastic bags, bubble wrap and pallet wrap, which are all not accepted by UK councils for recycling.

Battery waste is a growing issue worldwide, currently over three billion batteries are produced every year with no real way to recycle or reuse them in commercial products.

With global demand for li-ion batteries forecasted to grow ten per cent a year from 2020-25, the waste pile of batteries will carry on getting bigger. If electric and hybrid vehicles are removed from the forecast, the number falls to just 4 per cent per year. Gomi is pushing hard to work with electric car manufacturers to ensure that their batteries has a second life. They hope to release portable chargers made from electric car batteries later in the year too.

Tom said: "Over the past 9 months, we have diverted around 500kg of ‘non-recyclable’ plastic packaging waste from going to landfill. We hope that by introducing an affordable, fully-circular product built from recycled plastic material, we can increase this amount by over 10x. Helping to clean the planet of pollutant waste streams, but also create fun, everyday cherished products that people love to use."

Gomi taps into these specific waste streams, and transforms it from a pollutant waste into high-powered everyday Portable Chargers.

It works closely with food wholesalers in Sussex, to recycle all of the plastic packaging waste - intercepting it before it's sent to incineration or landfill. The Studio also accepts plastic waste from local households and businesses.

The studio is currently looking at new ways we can scale-up their production process to intercept more waste, and hopes to use the Kickstarter funds to achieve this.

Gomi are also offering a free return service to ensure the chargers are fully recycled at the end of life. Gomi can simply remelt the plastic down to make new products from.

To keep up with their progress beyond crowdfunding, you can follow Gomi on Instagram or sign up to their newsletter on their website.

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