Bollards made from sugar

Admit it. You like the taste of sugar. That sweetness is something we all seem to crave from time to time, but have you ever considered using sugar for other purposes than just to sweeten our food and make boring foodstuffs exciting and flavoursome? No? Well, someone has and they’ve taken it to the extreme. Today the world is only too aware of the dangers of emitting too much CO2 into the atmosphere and speeding up global warming and one of the biggest emitters of the gas is the concrete industry accounting for 8 per cent of the world’s CO2 production annually. Therefore an enterprising researcher recently came up with the novel idea of replacing concrete traffic-calming concrete bollards with one’s manufactured out of sugar cane.

The so called ‘non-crete’ posts are designed to be an eco version of the traditional barriers. They also weigh less and are cheaper and easier to install costing just £150 each one compared with £190 for a traditional concrete version.

Each sugar cane bollard is made from a plant-based plastic derived from sugar cane, the world’s most widely produced crop. In 2022 Hampshire County Council conducted a trial in a UK first in a bid to achieve the council’s stated aim of being carbon neutral by 2050.