An end to food piles? If you’ve ever thrown an apple core or half a cupcake onto the road in the hopes that nature’s biodegradation will kick in and recycle the food remnants for you, you should probably have been fined for polluting. Until now that is.
Waste engineers have teamed up with physicists to produce a special type of concrete capable of quickly absorbing any type of carbon-based food that hits the surface of the new type of super material. It seems a bit like a magic trick for those witnessing it for the first time, but the “Hungry” concrete marketed as EntrailMix Pervious Concrete, can dissolve 1600 kilograms of food in under 1 minute. Scientists have engineered it to only react to “food” items, making it safe for vehicles to drive on and humans to walk on. Just don’t drop your sandwich on the street, because it will be sucked down in moments.
The special concrete will help prevent food pollution by “eating” up piles of food. This could save cities billions of dollars in cleanup costs. A demonstration in a small section of the parking lot during the National Ribfest Fair proved a pleasant surprise for owners who did not have to clean up after the festival.
One video of the material bring tested shows the food disappearing without a trace. The only evidence that there may have been something there are loud burp-like noises that are emitted from the ground.
