Sustainable objects using cigarette butts

Cigarette butts are extremely harmful to your teeth, according to expert dentists in Mexico. They are also one of the objects that people throw away without caring about their degree of environmental contamination, but on the other hand they have served students of the Technological University of Mexico to create objects such as notebooks or pots based on cellulose pulp without environmental impact, the institution reported.

Ecofilter, the winning project of the “Unitec Award for Technological Innovation for Social Development”, will prevent the felling of 3,094 trees each year, helping to keep around 381,000 liters of water clean.

Collection of cigarette butts
Paola Garro, leader of the project, said that its development consists of the collection of cigarette butts, either by means of collections or specific containers, in order to give another use to these toxic waste.

We want to free the environment from this silent pollutant, which is uncontrollably thrown to the ground and causes great damage to nature and the environment, said the award-winner, who stressed that in Mexico 5,000 million butts are produced per year.

To transform the waste into something useful, the toxic substance is extracted from the cigarette end in a process that takes between 10 and 15 days.

Production of cellulose pulp
The purpose of the project is to revolutionize the paper sector in Mexico in the absence of a solid industry that produces cellulose pulp in the country, the majority being imported from the United States.

For this reason, he pointed out the need for “a cellulose pulp with recycled processes inside Mexico and that the price of paper, the price of notebooks and infinity of articles of this entire infrastructure can be reduced”.

Articles such as covers, soles, thermal and acoustic insulators, bricks, paper or cardboard are other uses that can be given to this material made by the residue of a vice that, according to the World Health Organization, ends life of 7 million people a year around the world.