Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Emerging Tech
  3. News

Italian teens’ vending machine turns plastic bottles into cell phone cases

Kelly Hodgkins
By

teens recycle plastic cell phone case vending machine italy my pro generation
MyProAction
A group of teenagers in Italy want to change how young people recycle their used plastic bottles and are doing something about it, reports Upworthy. Instead of throwing the waste bottles in the trash, the teens want their peers to dispose of their plastic bottles in a vending machine called the MyProGeneration, which converts the bottles into cell phone cases. The team of five from the Sicilian town of Bagheria developed the idea as part of Junior Achievement’s Biz Factory competition last year, and made it all the way to the finals in Milan.

The teens wanted to encourage their peers to think creatively about their trash and chose to use a vending machine, a piece of technology that is already familiar to the age group and easy to use. They also selected the name MyProGeneration because they wanted to promote the idea of proactiveness and encourage other teens to be “in favor of something, in favor of the environment,” said the team in a statement.

Recommended Videos

During the last stage of the Biz Factory contest, their project caught the eye of AXA Italia, which awarded them with the AXA Italia Social Impact Award. This award provided the teens with the opportunity to work with AXA Strategic Ventures and AXA’s Research Fund, two initiatives designed to help innovative projects move from concept to deliverable product.

Related

The proposed MyProGeneration is brilliant in its simplicity and appeal to the teen population. The recycling machine accepts plastic bottles and chips them into pellets that are then melted into a plastic filament. When the filament is ready, the vending machine allows the user to 3D print a cell phone case using the plastic material they just recycled. This process is completed within the vending machine, enabling users to experience firsthand the conversion of a waste bottle into something useful. The team built four prototypes last year and delivered them to customers. The team is currently looking for business partners to help fund the mass production of the vending machine hardware.

Editors' Recommendations

Topics
Kelly Hodgkins
Kelly Hodgkins
Contributor
Kelly's been writing online for ten years, working at Gizmodo, TUAW, and BGR among others. Living near the White Mountains of…
Ceramic ink could let doctors 3D print bones directly into a patient’s body
ceramic ink 3d printed bones bioprinting australia 2

Scientists use a novel ink to 3D print ‘bone’ with living cells

The term 3D bioprinting refers to the use of 3D printing technology to fabricate biomedical parts that, eventually, could be used to create replacement organs or other body parts as required. While we’re not at that point just yet, a number of big advances have been made toward this dream over the past couple of decades.

Read more
The future of making stuff: Inside the evolution of 3D printing with Formlabs
future of 3d printing formlabs ces 2021 castablewax40

When 3D printing went mainstream in the mid-2010s and exploded in popularity, it was about as hyped up as it possibly could be. Evangelists told us it would fundamentally transform the way goods were made, and usher in a bold new era of creative freedom. Soon, they said, we’d be able to fabricate anything we wanted on-demand, Star Trek replicator style, right from the comfort of our own homes.

But of course, 3D printing didn't really live up to that high-flying dream. Instead, it made a momentary splash and then largely returned to the fringes, gaining adoption in hobbyist workshops and cutting-edge product design labs, but not really changing the face of manufacturing in the way many hoped it might.

Read more
This vending machine gives out COVID tests, not candy bars
this vending machine gives out covid tests not candy bars test

From a distance, it looks like a regular candy bar dispenser, but get up close and you’ll quickly see that this is a vending machine with a difference.

For this one gives out not snacks but free COVID-19 tests.

Read more