The Better Bag
Hello my name is RBL and welcome to my blog for my school class biomimicry. If you don't know already biomimicry is looking at nature and seeing how we can learn, or adapt based off of it. In the start of this class we got to learn about plants and animals. Along with that we also got to look at some of the simple lessons that nature can teach us. Some of the lessons that I got from nature are being aware of water temperature, recycle carefully, and be careful of what you eat. For the class itself we also had field experiences where my class had the chance to get outside and see nature first hand. To learn about plants we went to the Lincoln Park Conservatory. Along with that the next day we got to go to the Lincoln Park Zoo to learn about how animals can adapt to nature as well. We even went to Plant Chicago where we got to learn how some people used different concepts of closed loop systems. This led up to our action project where we get to research organisms of our own choosing and see how we as humans can learn from them.
Here's my adaptation below:
The species that inspired me was hemp or Cannabis sativa. It can grow constantly and quickly. It's leaves and stems are short and leaf like. It also has been able to adapt to not produce as much THC compared to some of its other family members like marijuana. So over time hemp has grown to need less and less of the THC which is better for us because it won’t make us high. Hemps can be found in warm and humid climates like grasslands, mountains, and blustery deserts. Overall it can be grown in a lot of different places except winter climates. Now the main thing that makes hemp really unique is that it can be used in many different ways. The part that can give the most use is the fibres. To get these fibres the stalks have to dried, crushed, and shaked until the fibres are released from the stalks. These fibres are strong, and resistant to a lot of things which is where most of hemps fertility comes from. For example these fibres can be used to make t-shirts, cooking oils, or possible beauty products.
My closed loop cycle:
My solution for this is a closed loop cycle of making hemp based bags. I wanted to do this cycle because plastic bags are a thing we use everyday. Even so it's really bad for the environment because they take 10-20 years to decompose. With this idea it gives us a way to be more sustainable. Now the cycle starts with the hemp based plant and when when the hemp grows some of it will be sent to factories to be burned and made into cooking oils which will then be sent to grocery stores. The rest will be taken to a harvesting facility where the hemp fibers are harvested from the stems. Once these fibers are harvested they will then be turned into hemp based bags.
These bags will be stored in a relative temperature of 30-40 degrees Fahrenheit so they can degrade as slowly as possible. These bags will have an expiration date of 1-2 years and it will be placed on the insides of the bag. This is so customers and buyers can know when their bags will start degrading. Along with that on the expiration date I’d hope to put an address to a farm where the customer could send the degraded bag to. The bag will be 17 inches tall, 17 inches long, 9 inches wide, and a handle of 28 inches. When sending bags to stores they’ll be placed into a cardboard container. After the bags are sent it’s up to stores how they want the bags to be sold. My main goal for them is to serve as bags for everyday use. Customers can refrigerate their bags to make the bags last longer when not being used.
Once a bag finishes its degradation process customers can place their degraded bag back in the store container they got their bag from. Before a consumer might place the bag into the container I’d recommend that they either put the bag under cold water to wash it, or wash it in a washing machine. Once the container is full of the degraded bags it will be sent back to the bag facility so the bags can be disassembled. Once the bags have been disassembled the hemp fibres will be used as food at farms for animals like cows and horses. This is what makes my design a bit more unique compared to companies like Hempalaya because these bags post degradation could be used as a food source. When those animals then produce waste the waste will be used to then regrow new hemp plants so the process will continue. When new bags are made they’ll be sent back to stores so customers can receive new bags.
Now before I created this cycle I found out about Hempalaya hemp bag company. Their work was so similar to my own design that it made it hard for me to think about how I could make mine unique. That's when I decided to incorporate the bags into food for a farm so this process could become circular.
Here's how it looked at first:
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Concept Hemp bag closed looped process (Drawn December 14th, 2021) By RBL |
After doing some rewriting and finalizing my cycle here's a picture of it below:
Closed loop hemp bag cycle (Drawn December 15th, 2021) by RBL
Life's Principles:
When looking at this design I decided to learn from Life's Principles, which are a set of rules or guidelines that nature sets itself to. I found that my design hits two of the principles:
Be locally attuned and responsive - My design is using that by having customers fill out a survey that can allow them to share their opinions about the product and allow them to share how I could improve the design.
Be resource efficient - My design works with being resource efficient because of because of it’s closed looped concept. Closed looped means that every single part of my design can be a food or resource for another part of it. My design also doesn't have to rely on common things like fossil fuels because everything can be recycled.
An SDG connection:
The SDG's (sustainable development goals) are goals set by the United Nations to help improve the world around us. The goals that my design hits are:
SDG # 12 : Ensure sustainable consumption and production patterns
Target # 12.5 : By 2030, substantially reduce waste generation through prevention, reduction, recycling and reuse.
My main connection to this is that my hemp bags are trying to reduce the waste of things like plastic grocery bags.
Is it a part of of the circular economy?
My design is a part of a circular economy because all of the parts of my design can be put back into one another. For example, how when my bags are finished degrading they can be sent to a farm and can serve a new purpose. One possible idea I could use to power my facility freezers could be solar panels. The power from the sun could possibly be used to power the fridges that keep the bag containers cold in the facility.
Final conclusion:
Overall this unit was really enjoyable to me. This is because I managed to learn about animals and nature in ways I could never think of. For example like on our first day and observing trees around us and seeing the simple ways we can learn from them. This course also was able to get me to go outside, and thinking how simple things that I do everyday could affect entire ecosystems. I also enjoyed putting up this idea of a closed looped system and seeing how it could be shown in a good way. If I was to do this again I would probably try to do something a bit different with the hemp because it can be used in a lot of ways. Now I want this to serve as a wake up call to you. Originally I wanted to make this action project because of grocery bags getting caught in oceans and not serving a common purpose. Because of this I wanted to make these bags the way they are. Nature is a beautiful thing we all can learn something from it. So get out into nature, and see how you can learn from it yourself.
Sources:
Theodoredouc, Doucette. “Replacement of Plastic Bags with Reusable Hemp Bags.” Debating Science, 23 Apr. 2019, https://blogs.umass.edu/natsci397a-eross/replacement-of-plastic-bags-with-reusable-hemp-bags/.
“Hemp Livestock - Hemp Foods.” Hemp for Livestock, Hemp Foods Australia , https://www.hempfoods.com.au/assets/uploads/2014/04/Hemp-Livestock.pdf.
“Waste Not, Want Not: Recycling Hemp & Cannabis Bio-Waste.” Ministry of Hemp, 26 May 2020, https://ministryofhemp.com/blog/recycling-hemp/.
