Sustainable September - Driving the Circular Economy with re-universe

As part of our Sustainable September campaign, we are delighted to feature re-universe, a company dedicated to reducing waste and promoting circularity through innovative technology. This article shares re-universe’s journey in developing a platform that tracks and encourages the reuse of items, with a special focus on returnable coffee cups. re-universe was also the proud winner of the Cleantech Category at the 2024 Isle of Man Innovation Challenge.

Stay tuned for more insightful articles as we explore innovative ways businesses and individuals are embracing sustainability throughout the month!

Driving circularity with re-universe

re-universe is passionate about the circular economy and reducing waste. That is why we have built a platform to help businesses achieve greater levels of circularity, particularly through reuse. Our platform uses QR and RFID technology to track items through sales and return processes with the added facility of being able to add deposits, rewards or replacement charges to the item which are linked to the end user. A great example is returnable coffee cups where a deposit or holding charge is made at the point of purchase and refunded or cancelled when the cup is returned for reuse.

The returnable coffee cup system is already up and running at Blenheim Palace in Oxfordshire and The Eden Project in Cornwall. We are seeing return rates of 90% or more, and the removal of over a million single use cups every year across the two sites, with the carbon savings being over 75 tons per annum.

Winning the Innovation Challenge 2024

In May 2024, we were honoured to be selected as a finalist for the Isle of Man Innovation Challenge and went on to win the Cleantech category. This was for our vision to replace single use cups with digital returnable cups across the whole Island. The event itself was an excellent way of showcasing our technology to key people on the Island with the opportunity to network with them. We also gained valuable media coverage through print, online and radio of what we are trying to achieve. We would recommend any tech company in the sector to consider applying.

We have continued conversations subsequently with Business Isle of Man together with key stakeholders on the Island representing retailers and those who would be responsible for transport and washing logistics. Bringing everyone together to collaborate on the project has been a key benefit of working with Business Isle of Man. It’s all got very exciting!

Watch re-universe's 10 minute pitch at the 2024 Isle of Man Innovation Challenge here.

Tackling the Isle of Man’s Waste

We estimate that the Isle of Man uses around just over 1 single use cup per week per person. That might not sound like a lot, but it adds up to a whopping 4.75 million cups! The carbon impact of those cups which end up in incineration or landfill is estimated at nearly 300 tons. In short, it’s not a small problem, and the only way to deliver an efficient whole Island scheme is with good collaborators and robust technology to support the users and provide the necessary data.

Rapid deployment and success

Since the Innovation Challenge, we installed our system at The Eden Project. This was designed and delivered, including all equipment and materials from our group of very collaborative suppliers, in a period of just four weeks. Even we were amazed it could be done so quickly.

Future vision

Our focus is currently on delivering coffee cup schemes, but the technology capabilities go well beyond those and our next targets will be cold cups and food packaging. Beyond that, we can see opportunities for electrical goods under the WEEE legislation, battery recycling projects. Indeed, there are opportunities in any item that can carry an identifier that a business wants returned for reuse or recycling. The future of consumption has to be more circular, and we provide the technological glue to keep it all together.