The cotton candy machine that recycles plastic waste

While initiatives to recycle plastic waste are multiplying, students have created a “revolutionary” machine since it produces fibers – then used as textiles – from thermoplastics.

Its originality?

The

is inspired by cotton candy machines!

From plastic to a fiber “as insulating as glass wool”

“Our first prototype was simple: a drill, a soda can soldering tool, recalls Émile, one of its co-inventors.

It didn't work but our second try turned out to be much more conclusive”.

Once the machine was developed, “we were contacted by several NGOs who asked us if our technology and our material could be used to recycle waste from refugee camps and transform it into insulation”.

No sooner said than done: the

was delivered to Gaziantep (Turkey), near the Syrian border, where it produces a “very insulating fiber, a bit like glass wool”.

This fiber has already been used to insulate 15 houses in a refugee camp in Syria.

"It's precious because the winters are very harsh here," says Zakaria, head of the NGO

.

Discover their promising machine in this video from our partner Brut.

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• Planet

• Video

• Raw

• Recycling

• Plastic

• Syrian refugees

• Refugees camp

• Waste