17-year-old from California turns food waste into biodegradable paper towels

A 17-year-old California student has developed biodegradable absorbent sheets from food waste using recovered cellulose, pectin and calcium reinforcement. The laboratory-stage project points to a possible way to cut food waste and the footprint of disposable paper products.Meet Arnav Kodavati, the California teen giving food waste a new life as biodegradable paper towels (Image: isef.net)The next time you throw away a banana peel, vegetable scrap or other food waste, imagine it coming back as something you use every day, a paper towel. That simple but striking idea is at the heart of a remarkable project by 17-year-old California student Arnav Kodavati, who is exploring how discarded food can be transformed into biodegradable, absorbent sheets.Presented at the International Science and Engineering Fair, Kodavati’s research offers an inventive answer to two growing environmental challenges: the enormous amount of food that ends up as waste and the environmental footprint of disposable paper products.Instead of allowing plant-based food waste to become another discarded material, his approach attempts to recover its cellulose, the fibrous building material found in plants, and give it a second life.FROM SCRAPS TO ABSORBENT SHEETSKodavati’s process begins by drying and reducing food scraps into smaller particles. The material then undergoes acid, alkaline and bleaching treatments to remove unwanted components and isolate cellulose-rich fibres. The recovered cellulose is combined with pectin, a naturally occurring plant-based polymer, before being formed into thin sheets. The sheets are then treated with calcium chloride. Calcium ions help link charged groups in the pectin, creating a stronger internal structure.That reinforcement addresses one of the biggest challenges facing absorbent materials: they must soak up liquid quickly without disintegrating when wet.THE TRADE-OFF BETWEEN ABSORPTION AND STRENGTH Tests showed that calcium-based crosslinking could slow absorption by around 20% to 40% in some formulations. However, it substantially improved wet strength.Wet strength increased from approximately 0.19 newtons in uncrosslinked material to as much as 0.34 newtons after treatment. The prototypes, tested as 5-by-5-centimetre sheets, absorbed around 5 to 6 millilitres of liquid per sheet.The most promising formulations had effective pore sizes of roughly 20 to 30 micrometres, while different sheet weights and pectin concentrations were also tested.COULD WASTE-BASED PAPER TOWELS COST LESS?The project also explored whether the concept could eventually make economic sense.At large scale, Kodavati estimated a potential cost of about USD 2.98 for 100 sheets, compared with approximately USD 3.40 per 100 sheets for the sustainable paper towel used as a benchmark.But these figures are projections rather than evidence of an established commercial product. Large-scale production would have to account for food-waste collection and transport, processing, chemicals, energy, equipment and quality control.The changing composition of food waste presents another challenge. Different scraps can contain different amounts and types of cellulose, making consistency difficult to maintain.FROM PAPER TOWELS TO PACKAGINGThe idea could potentially extend beyond paper towels. With further development, the combination of recovered cellulose, plant-based pectin and calcium reinforcement could be explored for wipes, packaging materials and absorbent mats.Each product would require its own balance of strength, softness, stiffness and absorbency.A SMALL PROTOTYPE, A BIGGER POSSIBILITYKodavati’s invention is still a laboratory-stage concept, and much more research and larger-scale testing are needed before it could become a commercial product. Yet its promise lies in its simplicity: turning something we throw away into something we use again.For a 17-year-old researcher, that is more than an experiment. It is an inspiring glimpse of how the waste of today could become the sustainable material of tomorrow.- EndsPublished By: Apoorva AnandPublished On: Aug 19, 2026 09:53 IST