BIO
UX Project
Team Refine developed a smart sink to prevent waste from going to landfills by streamlining the process for recycling in-home consumers that want to be more sustainable in their homes do so conveniently and purposefully.
Pricing
Standards
Our research found sinks and vanities range in cost from $200-$3800 USD for high-quality appliances,
we want to make our product accessible while still providing a level of satisfaction and quality that is expected by consumers. This is why we have calculated our predetermined cost starting with our base-level model appliance at $750.00, our medium size at $3000.00, and our $10,000.00 industrial size.
Concept Video
8,000,000,000,000
8 billion people in this world and there there are a few things
that ties each and every one of us together.
To Stay Alive
The earth sustains a global population of 8 billion people, providing the essential resources necessary for our survival. Despite this critical dependency, the annual volume of waste produced is staggering, with approximately 140 million tons of refuse being deposited in landfills.
Regrettably, a significant percentage of this waste could be recycled and repurposed to preserve resources and mitigate environmental damage. As a further illustration of this concerning trend, over 90 million tons of recyclable materials are carelessly discarded into US landfills each year.
High demand,
Low supply
Shockingly, the practice of recycling is not embraced as widely as one might expect, with only around 32% of people in the United States actively engaging in the recycling process. This lack of participation is primarily attributed to the inconvenience of recycling programs and a lack of public awareness regarding the necessity of responsible waste management.
Moreover, even when plastic is recycled, the improper sorting and disposal of contaminated items can undermine the recycling process. Unfortunately, a single improperly sorted item can contaminate an entire load of recycled waste, rendering it useless for repurposing.
Despite these alarming statistics, a vast majority (75%) of Americans believe that recycling should be accorded top priority in environmental conservation. As such, urgent measures must be taken to facilitate more convenient and accessible recycling programs, coupled with robust public education campaigns to promote responsible waste management practices.
We decided to use this fruitful opportunity
to help consumers limit waste in their homes,
so we asked ourselves,
"How might we help consumers prevent waste from going to landfills by streamlining the process for recycling in-home?"
We defined the main value pillars for our solution to develop around:
-
Convenience
-
Streamline
-
Repurpose
minimizing the amount of effort needed from consumers
being convenient for people to use
making sure waste makes it to is recycled
Introducing BIO
BIO operates by enabling a user to dispose of their waste materials
by placing them into the sink. This is initiated when a user with a desire
to discard their trash approaches the sink, holding the waste materials in their hand.
Categorization
Once placed, cameras equipt with image recognition technology categorizes materials into recyclable and non-recyclable materials.
Leveraging artificial intelligence that does specifically image recognition trained to identify different waste materials, would allow us to autonomously streamline the processes of recycling for users as well as minimize the effort needed to sort waste.
Decontamination
Once categorized, the mechanical arm
washes the materials and places them into corresponding compartments.
Washing of materials helps prevent contamination in the recycling process helping us reach our third pillar of maximizing the number of recyclable materials that actually get recycled.
Retaining
the Basics
Beyond its recycling function,
BIO retains the standard features of a sink,
such as the ability to perform washing tasks and adjust water temperature settings.
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Consumer Segmentation
Consumers are able to select from 3 different model sizes of BIO:
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Compact
Portable option
for those who do not own homes
USD 900
Tray Size of 8 Gallons
Plastic Material
Custom Color
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Standard
Medium-size option
for those who own homes
and want to integrate smart technology into their space
USD 3000
Tray Size of 18 Gallons
Custom Material
Custom Color
Industrial
A large industrial-size option
for businesses such as grocery chains and restaurants that deal with significant amounts of waste
USD 10,000
Tray Size of 80 Gallons
Stainless Steel Material
N/A of Customization
Pricing
Standards
Our research found sinks and vanities range in cost from $200-$3800 USD for high-quality appliances,
we want to make our product accessible while still providing a level of satisfaction and quality that is expected by consumers. This is why we have calculated our predetermined cost starting with our base-level model appliance at $750.00, our medium size at $3000.00, and our $10,000.00 industrial size.
Customization
Providing the ability for consumers to customize their products
based on personal preference, choosing from a selection of materials, finishes, and hardware that would be subject to price changes as necessary.
Partnerships
We believe it would be beneficial to partner with Google due to their research in image recognition AI and their ability to help us train our system to identify materials as accurately as possible.
We also believe partnering up with Tesla
would be beneficial thanks to the advancements within robotics, developing the next generation of automation, including general-purpose robots capable of performing tasks that are repetitive that we believe could be leveraged within BIO.
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Extensive Interactions
We developed user interfaces an app for devices with the intention of accessibility and engagement to the experience. However, we decided to leave this as an opportunity point to extensively work on as it was not aligned with one of our main values, "streamline", creating another pathway for the user to interact with the recycling process that may apply as a distraction factor for the users to familiarize with the initial experience principally involving the sink.
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This project was in participation to the SCAD StartUp 2023,
a week-long business design competition, aimed at challenging everyone from across all 30+ majors at SCAD to research, build, and pitch a world-changing idea to industry professionals. This competition is led by FLUX (SCAD UX design club) and supported by the SCADpro collaborative design studio.