Two win ners were announced at the inaugural UofG's Innovation of Year Award at this Year's Gryphon's LAAIR event, today.

The BDDC innovation received the award for the creation of the 100% Compostable Bio-composite Resin using coffee chaff (waste stream of coffee roasting industry). The material is used to make compostable ring, as a part of the PurPod100™ - the world's first fully compostable single-serve coffee pod. This innovation could divert 15 billion coffee pods going to landfill at end of single use and reduce fossil-fuel based resin imports. One study by Quantis International estimated that this innovation can serve to reduce GHG emissions by 140,000 tons annually.

Team members who developed this innovation are: Amar Mohanty, Manjusri Misra, Nima Zarrinbakhsh, Rajendran Muthuraj, Tao Wang, Arturo Rodriguez and Singaravelu Vivekanandhan.

Thanks to Competitive Green Technologies who commercialized the biomaterial production and scale up manufacturing processes, Fourmark the molder who believed in bio-composite resin molded parts being the future and Club Coffee for assembling the ring made with this compostable bio-composite resin and package the single serve coffee soft pod and take that to market.

Thanks to OMAFRA, AAFC and MRI for their funding support.

The Innovation of the Year Award was co-awarded to the innovation leading to the development of a carbohydrate vaccine for Clostridium difficile (C. difficile), to a team led by Prof. Mario Monteiro, Department of Chemistry.

The Gryphon's LAAIR event is Dragon’s Den-style event where faculty pitch for funding to commercialize their research.

Read more at UofG news.