FoodTubes: feed-up yourself
Well, foodtubes? What does it inspire for you? Perhaps some kind of dehydrated food for astronauts? Not at all. Actually it's one of the most amazing, funny and crazy eco-friendly projects. A team based in the UK thought the hair-brained project up to transport food like internet data, in order to reduce carbon dioxide emissions and the corresponding global warning impacts. This team was even the runner-up in the 2008 St Andrew's prize1 for the environment competition with this project.
That sounds great, a little far-fetched, but still great. However, how it could work? Do you remember pneumatic tube transport, the fastest way to move the printed word? Probably, we remember better the pneumatic post. The mail was propelled by compressed air in cylindrical containers through a network of tubes. And that's the point: it would work almost like this system but with magnetic induction instead of compressed air. Easy!
Well, easy, if we are an engineer. But still complicated for everybody else. Imagine a 1000 miles underground foodtubes ring network circling the UK. This network could connect all major food producers and retailers via 1000Â kg of controlled air pressure pipes. By and large, we put food in metal capsules (one by two meters). Then the capsules are shifted through tubes in the underground tunnels, at speed of up to 60 miles per hour2. So the tubes are directed by induction motors and routed by intelligent software to their destinations. Ouf! In a nutshell, it's not so far-fetched. But considerably expensive.
So what do they want to deliver food by pipes for? Have you ever realised how much energy we use only to transport food to supermarkets? 25 % of lorries are used to transport food. Of the fuel used to move food vehicles, only 8 % is really needed to transport the cargoes to supermarkets, the other 92 % is used to transport the lorry itself! As a result, the energy savings over road distribution would be huge. Whilst there will be increasing amounts of electricity used to power the new system, this could come from green sources! And the lorries would never be stuck in awful traffic jams. Then the shopping would never be cancelled anymore because of the severe weather conditions! 1. St Andrew's prize for the environment competition is an initiative by the University of St Andrews in Scotland and the international integrated energy company, ConocoPhilips. The Prize recognises significant contributions to environmental conservation. 2. See foodtubes project on noelhodson.com
