AOKO Food Recycling

What it does

AOKO is a modular recycling system that converts food waste to compost in schools within 48 hours. The system allows flexibility in configurations when implemented in school cafeterias. It encourage students to practice food recycling in schools.

Your inspiration

Food waste is a major issue that is currently tackled in Singapore. I was inspired by food leftovers left by consumers at hawker centres. Food waste is discarded as most hawker centres do not own waste digesters due to expensive costs. As a result, carbon emissions are produced while trying to process the excess food waste. Landfills such as Pulau Semaukau are expected to run out of space by 2035. The public can participate to reduce carbon footprint by repurposing food waste. With threatening issues such as food insecurity and global warming, an alteration of habits should be educated to promote a healthier environment for the masses.

How it works

Food waste is first discarded into a perforated cylinder in the dehydrator. The dehydrator has to grind and dehydrator food waste constantly to provide a stable supply of compost within 48 hours. The dehydrator consists of a stainless steel perforated cyclinder, DC motor, internal copper heating wires, a rod to hold multiple cutting blades in the perforated cyclinder and a plug to ensure constant power source. Firstly, food leftovers have to be cut to fine bits and moisture extracted using high-speed rotation cutting and heat. Customized 3 steel 6 point-blender blades aid the efficient cutting of food waste. This is located at the bottom of the perforated cylinder to grind food waste. Next, the heat from the copper wires is heated from within in order to extract moisture from food waste. A plastic attachment is attached at the bottom to the rod of DC motor to ensure that the cyclinder is attached to the moving motor at all times.

Design process

The initial concept was a return station in hawker centre. As hawker centres are very common in Singapore, the purpose was to provide an easy implementation of return stations with many return points. The station would include a compost bin that would be collected by staff to be disposed in parks as fertilizer. The station's dimension was 2 x 0.8 x 2m. However, it was too bulky and inconvenient for cleaners to manage as it requires constant disposal of waste as there is an overwhelming amount of food waste with a few number of elderly cleaners. Hence, the context was changed from hawker centres to schools. Both faced similar problems as food waste was also disposed in schools. Research was conducted to understand the technology of dehydration in a food dehydrator. Product autopsy was carried out. All parts were disassembled to gain an in-depth understanding of core components such as perforated cylinder and a motor to ensure constant power supply. Next, the design of food dehydrators consist of the form, CMF and overall size to accommodate the technology inside the dehydrator. Height and width were essential to ensure that students can reach to dispose food waste yet wide enough to hold a large capacity of food waste. The dimension of food dehydrators are W 250 x H 750 mm.

How it is different

Currently, food waste is immediately disposed as there is no strict enforcement. It allows an easy way to discard and recycle food leftovers within 48 hours. It is designed to repurpose food waste into compost, thus reducing the demand of landfill and methane as a by-product from food waste processing. The perforated cylinder also eases the disposal of compost with its volume capacity. It is converted to compost for school gardens. The system has flexible configurations of arrangements when placed in a school canteen setting. The length can be extended or shortened by increasing the number of dehydrators and return stations depending on canteen size and layout. Each canteen stall is assigned to a rectangular collection tray. Thus, each return station accommodates cutleries for two stalls. It allows the ease of collection by cleaners when used cutleries are organized by stalls rather than the previous system of manual assigning after dishwashing.

Future plans

Processing food waste has to be more efficient to align with the demand of food waste disposal. This would be implemented in hawker centres where the main source of food waste originates from. The development consist of cheaper manufacturing cost as it would be implemented nationwide. Next, food dehydrators have to be refined in order to accommodate a larger volume capacity for food waste and a taller dehydrator to fit adults as well. The purpose is to eliminate food waste that fills a limited landfill in Singapore. Hence, it encourages the public to develop healthy food recycling practice.

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