Students gain $15,000 to grow GreenBox project

If you’re like most Americans, it’s probably a regular habit to scrape a half-full plate into the garbage, or dump a box of leftovers after they get left in the fridge a few days too long.

It might not seem excessively wasteful on an individual level, but according to engineering professor and GreenBox project advisor Matthew Franchetti, Americans end up generating 34 million tons of food waste a year. A team of students at the University of Toledo is aiming to turn that waste into opportunity through their new GreenBox project.

John Martillotta, a fourth-year mechanical engineering student who has been working on the project since fall for his senior project, said GreenBox is a system of collecting food waste and recycling it to convert what would have become waste into usable forms of energy. The project has been awarded $15,000 to continue developing GreenBox.

“GreenBox incorporates community involvement through the recycling of each participant’s individual and household food waste. By dropping their food waste off at a Greenbox unit, the participant will receive rewards or points towards gift cards or things of that nature,” Martillotta said.

The team is participating in the People, Prosperity and Planet Student Design Competition. According to the competition guidelines on the EPA website, the goal of the competition is for students to benefit people, promote prosperity and protect the planet by designing environmental solutions that move towards a sustainable future.

If the Greenbox prototype receives positive feedback in Washington, D.C. this spring during Phase II of the competition, the team could be awarded another $75,000.

The team of Toledo students chose to create the Greenbox last semester as a senior project, and is made up of both engineering students and business students. The students spend 5-10 hours a week working on Greenbox and will be competing against 38 other universities at the competition.

“Greenbox is very important to me. It attacks a nearly untapped issue in our country and presents a great opportunity to advance our country further into the sustainability movement. Greenbox helps our nation grow closer to utilizing its incredible resources through active and rewarding community involvement,” Martillotta said.

Martillotta said the award money will be used to create the prototype as well as allow the team to travel to D.C. to present it to the EPA. Franchetti said he plans to have a functional prototype on campus by the end of the semester. He plans on Greenbox taking about three years to take off.

Even if the U.S. EPA does not choose to award the team $75,000, Franchetti said the Ohio EPA is highly interested in the project, so Greenbox will likely still be pursued.

Franchetti said Greenbox not only helps solve landfill issues, but also creates this green renewable energy source. He explained that if the US were able to convert half the food waste generating into energy, it would create enough energy to power 2.5 million homes for a year.

“One way to think of Greenbox is as a food waste collection kiosk. It can be compared to Redbox, but instead of dropping off a disk, people drop off food waste,” Franchetti said.

The Greenbox also provides a business aspect too. Restaurants could deposit food waste and receive points, which could help their public relations. The Greenbox will also record savings and environmental protection for a company or individual person by allowing depositors to swipe a card or enter a number, as if they have their own account.

“This project helps push the knowledge on food waste, which has been a big problem for years. Hopefully it will at least create solutions that could branch into bigger things,” Franchetti said.