What it does
The restaurant industry generates large volumes of waste alcohol each year; if not properly handled, this leads to resource waste and environmental pollution, and the cost of recycling is prohibitively high.
Your inspiration
The restaurant industry generates a large volume of waste alcohol each year, and if not properly treated, this leads to resource waste and environmental pollution. However, interviews with restaurant managers have revealed that the cost of recycling waste alcohol is prohibitively high, so they often choose to discard it outright due to the cumbersome handling process. In response to the rapidly growing demand for environmental disinfection, we have adopted a localized closed‑loop solution by distilling recovered waste alcohol into cleaning‑grade ethanol.
How it works
First, after the server wheels the cart to the collection point, they invert the empty bottles to pour waste alcohol into the machine’s collection tank. The refining unit then runs multiple distillation cycles to purify the ethanol—regardless of the original beverage type, repeated distillation brings it up to cleaning‑grade standards. Once purified, the cleaning ethanol can either be bottled individually by the server or directed into the cart’s onboard reservoir for mobile spray‑cleaning. This integrated cart‑based design keeps servers engaged in the entire recovery process while optimizing the cleaning workflow.
Design process
We used the most readily available pot at hand as the vessel for heating waste alcohol, setting up a simple simulated distillation with condenser, cooling, and inlet/outlet water zones. We chose common beer and red wine as the feedstocks in a 1:1 ratio for testing. High‑temperature distillation confirmed that the alcohol concentration steadily increased, and after thirty minutes of purification at elevated temperature, the ABV rose from 15° to 30°. Since a household stovetop has limited heating power, the process takes longer, whereas a dedicated distillation apparatus would achieve higher efficiency.
How it is different
Currently, there is no equipment specifically designed for restaurants to recycle waste alcohol. The waste‑alcohol refining machine can purify collected waste alcohol into cleaning‑grade ethanol, enhancing the environmental sustainability of alcohol production. The purified ethanol can also be bottled for sale, reducing businesses’ costs for externally purchased cleaning alcohol. At the same time, this establishes a localized closed‑loop system of “waste as a resource” for restaurants and merchants.
Future plans
For the distillation component, we will test distillation efficiency and energy consumption across different types of alcohol to optimize performance. For deployment, we’ll segment applications into residential, commercial, and energy‑refueling scenarios. The residential unit—handling the smallest volumes—will be redesigned for lightweight operation, while for energy refueling, the purified ethanol from waste alcohol will serve as one of the feedstocks for flexible fuels. We’ll develop ethanol fueling stations to expand circular waste‑alcohol applications across venues, market channels, and customer segments.
Awards
2025 Sustainable Living Lab Competition – Excellence Award 2025 Environmental Care Design Competition – Excellence Award 2025 Pegasus Startup Entrepreneurship Competition, Innovative Startup Team (Business Services Division) – Excellence Award
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