0
0
0
For runners, footwear is one of the most important – and often most expensive – pieces of gear. Experts say the typical lifespan of a traditional running sneaker falls between 310 to 435 miles, or about four to six months, depending on usage.
The shoe industry also comes at a great cost to the environment: from production to end-of-life, it generates about 700 million tons of carbon dioxide per year, according to research by Quantis, an environmental sustainability consultancy.
Footwear is notoriously hard to recycle because it can contain dozens of different materials that need to be processed separately. But Danny Pormes and his wife, Erna, decided to try and find a way to recycle shoes in their entirety.
"Everybody told us, 'it's not going to work, it's impossible,'" Pormes recalls. But after months of experimenting in their kitchen – which involved microwaving and boiling shoes, along with a few disasters – they finally came up with a proof of concept. From there, they partnered with a machine manufacturing company, Heilig Group, which helped bring their shoe recycling factory FastFeetGrinded to life.
Tap the link in bio for more.
📸 : CNN
