The Philippines is the second-largest producer of coconuts in the world. An estimated 9 billion husks are burned or left to rot here every year. Fortuna Cools makes coolers out of that waste instead of the commonly used expanded polystyrene foam, often incorrectly called styrofoam. We make more than 14 million tons of this hard-to-recycle plastic every year.
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00:00 For every coconut crack to make oil, about one pound of husk gets left behind.
00:07 Farmers often burn these massive piles or just leave them to rot.
00:13 But not here in the province of Cebu in the Philippines.
00:17 One company has figured out a way to transform them into biodegradable insulation for coolers.
00:23 It was not really our invention, it was the palm tree.
00:27 Most of the coolers around here are made with plastic foam, which breaks apart easily, is
00:31 hard to recycle, and often winds up in waterways.
00:34 But is coconut insulation as efficient?
00:37 And can you really replace plastic foam with coconut waste?
00:44 Nearly 350 million coconut trees grow in plantations all over the island nation.
00:55 Farmers like Edgardo Antipolo harvest their trees every three months.
00:59 His hands and feet fit into little notches carved into the trunk as he moves toward the
01:03 fruit high above.
01:06 Coconut trees can grow to over 80 feet tall.
01:10 But there are other risks besides falling.
01:12 They collected about 3,000 coconuts from this harvest, worth about $270.
01:35 That includes money for the husks that protect the inner shell of the coconut meat.
01:39 In the past, they would be thrown out or burned.
01:43 But now, the Fortuna Cools factory receives up to three truckloads of whole coconuts a
01:48 day, which they will turn into insulation.
01:52 The company collects the fruits from more than 250 small farms within miles of the processing
01:56 plant.
01:57 First, workers split the tough outer shell on a sharp spike called a bong bunote.
02:05 The nuts are separated and open for the meat inside.
02:10 This is the coconut meat, which they would bring to another process of cooking where
02:15 they can convert this into coconut oil and other oil derivatives.
02:21 Julius Bucatora grew up on his family's coconut farm.
02:24 Today, he is Fortuna Cools' director of operations.
02:28 The coconut farmers is the poorest sector of farmers.
02:32 I found opportunity to actually go back to my roots and give back.
02:36 The husks dry for up to a week before going to what's called a decorticating machine.
02:41 Inside, they are crushed and spun to loosen the fibers from the outer sheath.
02:47 So from this husk, they can recover the fibers and some cocoa peat.
02:52 The cocoa peat holds water well, making it ideal for irrigating plants.
02:57 A spin through the sifting machine removes any remaining dust.
03:02 The fibers are now ready to be made into insulation.
03:06 Strands get layered over each other and stitched together by a needle punch, producing a cloth.
03:16 A hydraulic press uses heat and pressure to fuse the strands together.
03:20 Finally, workers cut them to the proper size.
03:25 And voila, coconut insulation.
03:28 So once we are ready with the panels, we insert it to the sleeves.
03:34 And this now serves as the insulation for this bag.
03:39 But at first, the entrepreneurs who started Fortuna Cools were trying to solve a problem
03:43 for fishermen rather than find a use for coconut waste.
03:47 I wish I could tell you that a coconut fell on my head one day and when I woke up, I realized
03:52 that I had a million dollar material on my head.
03:56 But yeah, it wasn't quite that perfect of a story.
04:00 In 2018, David Cutler and his business partner, Tamara Meckler, noticed that small boat fishermen
04:06 who went after big fish like yellowfin tuna needed help.
04:10 The fishermen had no way to keep their fish fresh and in a high condition from the time
04:16 it was caught in the middle of the ocean to the time it reached the shore or the market
04:20 several hours later.
04:22 Our very first products were actually made out of plastic, I'm a bit embarrassed to admit.
04:28 But the cheap plastic broke easily and had to be replaced often.
04:32 That's when they noticed coconut husks piling up everywhere.
04:35 And so that started as just a convenient prototyping material for us.
04:40 And it emerged as a really potentially high performance and affordable material that we
04:45 could use over the long term.
04:48 Their first batch of 200 coconut coolers were large enough to fit a whole tuna, but collapsible
04:53 so they could fit into tiny boats.
04:55 Hence the company name, 4Tuna.
04:59 Get it?
05:00 Now these fishermen can stay out at sea longer.
05:04 But why do coconut husks work for this kind of thing?
05:07 Coconut fiber happens to have a lot of these trapped air pockets.
05:11 And so we can kind of harness that natural insulating capacity as our insulation.
05:18 The fibers help protect the inside of the fruit from the hot tropical sun.
05:23 Under a microscope, they even look similar to expanded polystyrene foam, what many people
05:28 call styrofoam.
05:31 Styrofoam coolers are used extensively throughout the Philippines for pretty much anything that
05:36 requires insulation.
05:37 Especially for seafood.
05:40 In the Philippines, over 2 million people work in seafood-related industries.
05:45 Here we are in Cebu's biggest fish market.
05:48 So this is where most of the fish trades is done.
05:53 Every day, thousands of people buy and sell fish using plastic foam boxes.
05:58 Once it gets loaded with fish, it moves to the next vendor who will provide a new styrobox
06:02 and then the consumer bringing their styrobox.
06:06 The boxes' benefits, being lightweight and cheap, are also their biggest problems.
06:11 It easily breaks down into microplastics.
06:14 These are the ones that are easily washed onto the waterways.
06:16 It goes to the river, then from the river it goes to the ocean.
06:20 They're so small that fishes will consume them like their regular food.
06:25 Those microplastics stay in the digestive system of the fish and the fish will not grow
06:31 and will not consume food anymore.
06:34 And in that case, they tend to die and then it stops the whole cycle of replenishing the
06:40 fish system.
06:43 These plastic-filled fish might also pose a danger to humans who eat them.
06:48 Microplastics can penetrate human organs and even destroy red blood cells.
06:52 On top of that, one of the building blocks of polystyrene foam is a known carcinogen.
06:58 It's a traditional way of using to store cold food and we never had any replacement for
07:05 that in a commercial level.
07:08 And since the boxes are 98% air, you need a lot of them to make recycling profitable
07:13 and few places have the equipment to do so.
07:16 But foam boxes are not just confined to the Philippines.
07:19 They're used at most of the world's top fishing ports.
07:22 In Japan, over 15,000 pounds of fish boxes get dumped every day.
07:27 The British seafood market annually goes through 22 million of them, a figure that rises by
07:32 10% every year.
07:35 We're trying to replace as much plastic foam with natural fiber as we possibly can and
07:40 benefit thousands and thousands of coconut farmers in the process.
07:45 Fortuna Cools is now working with seafood suppliers in the Philippines to replace the
07:49 styro boxes with coconut ones.
07:53 But it's also pivoted from coolers for fishermen to ones for regular consumers.
07:58 Co-founder Tamara Meckler moved to New York City to market Fortuna's new Nutshell cooler,
08:03 which builds on the original idea.
08:05 We settled on collapsibility and foldability as a really critical feature for our coolers.
08:10 The company also makes the exterior shell in the Philippines using recycled plastic
08:14 bottles.
08:15 Each Nutshell cooler is made with 37 coconut husks for insulation as well as 50 recycled
08:22 plastic bottles for the outer liner material.
08:25 Fortuna Cools claims Nutshell coolers can keep ice frozen for up to 48 hours.
08:31 We've sold over a thousand Nutshell coolers and we have another thousand in the pipeline.
08:37 And they're already trying to improve the design by making it completely biodegradable.
08:42 So far we haven't found the perfect natural liner.
08:46 That's why we're using recycled polyester.
08:48 But it's something we're working hard that can match the story of the coconut fiber.
08:54 They've processed more than 600,000 coconuts so far.
08:57 And in 2022, they brought in over half a million dollars in revenue.
09:02 The company aims to help more struggling coconut farmers as it provides a suitable replacement
09:07 for plastic.
09:08 But once you start telling them the story of, you know, you show them the coconut fiber,
09:14 you know we can actually make this coconut fiber into this insulation panel.
09:18 And then you show them the bag.
09:20 You'll have that aha moment that will really inspire them.
09:24 Oh, before I was just burning this and before I was just trying to throw it away.
09:29 And now they see this very beautiful product.
09:32 [music]