The Shellworks is all about taking unknown bio-material and trying to bring it into the mainstream.

Shellworks 的宗旨就是把大家陌生的生物材料帶到眼前。

Together they make bioplastics from lobster shells.

他們從龍蝦殼中提煉物質，並製成生物塑料。

The team is comprised of architects and mechanical engineers and product design engineers.

團隊成員有建築師、機械工程師，以及產品設計工程師。

And we all had this fascination with food waste and specifically crustacean waste and fish waste, which is not often looked at from a design-and-engineering point of view.

我們都對廚餘很感興趣，特別是甲殼類動物和魚的廚餘。以設計和工程的角度來看，這些素材都不是關注的焦點。

The shells of these crabs and lobsters will sometimes just go to a landfill where they can start emitting methane.

甲殼類的殼有時候會直接送進掩埋場，之後便開始排放甲烷 (沼氣)。

And we were interested in whether there was a way to valorize that waste stream.

我們想知道有沒有辦法可以穩定廢物流。

Over 250,000 tons of crustacean waste are produced every year in the EU alone.

光在歐洲，每年就產生超過 25 萬噸的甲殼類廚餘。

That waste is equal to about 1,600 blue whales.

相當於 1,600 隻藍鯨的重量。

But what's so valuable about that waste?

然而，這樣的廢物價值為何？

We found this biopolymer inside crustacean shells called chitin that you can treat in a certain way to extract and actually make a bioplastic from those shells.

我們在殼裡發現一種叫「甲殼素」的生物聚合物，此物質可以用某種方式提煉製成生物塑料。

Chitin is the second-most abundant organic material on earth.

甲殼素是地球上含量第二高的有機物質。

It's found in insects, fungi, and crustaceans.

在昆蟲、真菌類，以及甲殼類體內可發現其蹤跡。

We started working with lobsters because they're a really interesting waste source.

我們從龍蝦開始著手，因為他們是很有趣的廢物來源。

By weight, chitin accounts for about 30% of the shell, and it's also the case that with lobsters they're eaten at the restaurant.

甲殼素含量約佔殼總重的 30%，而在餐廳吃的龍蝦也佔總食物量的 30%。

So as opposed to shellfish or shrimp where they get industrially deshelled, these lobster shells are just going to waste at the restaurant source.

所以，其他甲殼類或蝦子會以工業化的方式去殼，但龍蝦殼在餐廳才被丟到廚餘桶。

Through chemical processes, all that chitin can be turned into chitosan, which is where The Shellworks comes in.

化學處理後，甲殼素可以被轉換成殼聚糖，從這裡開始，Shellworks 就出馬了。

What you need to do is to extract the chitosan before you can use it as a bioplastic.

要在製成生物塑料之前把殼聚糖提煉出來。

So the first stage is an extraction, which is this machine behind me.

因此第一步是提煉，也就是我身後這台機器。

So we've designed four machines, Shelly, Sheety, Vaccy, and Dippy.

我們設計了四台機器：Shelly、Sheety、Vaccy 與 Dippy。

The first machine is an extraction unit.

第一台是提煉設備。

We basically put in ground-up lobster shells.

我們把磨碎的龍蝦殼丟進去。

It runs through a set of processes, and out comes the powder, which is the chitosan.

經過一系列的程序後，就變成粉狀物，也就是殼聚糖。

We will start with the shells.

首先從殼著手。

We will extract the chitosan powder and then to that we will add vinegar in varying ratios.

我們把殼聚糖粉萃取出來，之後加入不同比例的醋。

That will form a kind of chitosan and bioplastic goop, which we will put into the dip-forming machine.

這會形成一種殼聚糖和生物塑料的膠狀物，我們將其放入浸漬連續製造的機器 (dip-forming machine) 中。

Each machine is kind of good for making a different thing.

每台機器各有用途。

The sheet-former obviously only makes sheets.

紙頁成型器 (sheet-former) 就只負責製造紙張。

The vacuum-former is good for making kind of less three-dimensional reliefs, so things like blister packaging.

真空成型機 (vacuum-former) 讓物件比較不那麼立體，像是泡殼包裝。

And then the dip-molder is excellent for making really extruded shapes, so very three-dimensional objects.

浸著成型器 (dip-molder) 擅長以浸泡的方式製模，其屬非常立體的物件。

We can also make plastic bags from these sheets by gluing them together with more of the bioplastic, which means that the bag is 100% chitosan and so it's much more easily recycled.

可以用生物塑料將其黏著製成塑膠袋，也就是說袋子成分是 100% 的殼聚糖，所以更容易回收利用。

We used our projects to illustrate that the material can actually be formed into lots of applications that could be a really compelling replacement for some single-use plastic items.

我們的企劃展示材料的各種應用，這可能成為一次性塑料產品的勁敵。

So we have designed plant pots that self-fertilize.

因此我們設計出自花授粉的盆栽。

So they actually get planted with the plant in the ground, and as they biodegrade, they become a fertilizer for the plant.

這些盆栽和其他植物一起栽種，等到生物分解後就變成該盆栽的肥料。

The bioplastic is water soluble, which is both a blessing and a curse.

生物塑料是水溶性的，而這個特性一體兩面。

It makes it very easy to recycle, but obviously limits the applications that we can do with it.

一方面來說，它很容易回收利用；另一方面來說，其應用的層面很明顯被限制。

So we're looking at ways of waterproofing material with kind of natural wax coatings that would make it more applicable for a wider range of things.

所以我們正在尋找外層含有天然蠟的防水材質，使該生物塑料應用的範圍更廣泛。

I describe the machines as quite accessible.

我會說這台機器還滿容易上手的。

We kind of designed them from scratch in workshops, so potentially other people could also build these machines.

我們算是從零開始都在工作坊設計該機器，所以其他人也有可能自製這些機器。

The project is all about bridging the gap between science and industry.

整個企劃就是要架起科學與工業之間的橋梁。

We find that there's so much stuff out there in scientific papers which never actually makes it into industry, which is a real shame.

我們發現科學領域裡有許多東西尚未和工業做結合，實屬可惜啊！

So we've kind of taken inspiration from certain things that we've found in scientific papers.

所以我們從某些科學知識得到靈感。

And developed those into processes that might be scalable in industry to kind of really make this bioplastic something that could be feasible in the real world.

再將其發展應用、與工業結合，讓生物塑料不再只是夢。