Winners were selected last week for the second Cradle to Cradle Product Design Challenge presented by the Cradle to Cradle Products Innovation Institute, a non-profit organization; Autodesk, a 3D design software company; and the Alcoa Foundation, a lightweight metals technology, engineering and manufacturing company. Several of the innovations may help springboard ideas in the waste industry.

Lewis Perkins, interim president of the Cradle to Cradle Products Innovation Institute based in San Francisco, says how products and materials are designed to be used, re-used, disposed of, or recycled have huge impacts on—and potential benefits for—the waste industry.

“(The) institute envisions remaking the way we make things, so all products can be composed of safe materials that can be perpetually and continuously cycled,” he says. “If we can inspire the design community and all industries to consider material health, material reutilisation, renewable energy and carbon management, water stewardship, and social fairness, we can enable the solid waste industry to be a crucial facilitator for efficiency and maximizing value for our global population.”

Perkins says this year’s winners each exemplify the quest for material health and reuse.

“This is where dealing with solid waste becomes ‘nutrient management’—when all materials retain their value, the nutrient management industry becomes a key player in the movement and distribution of resources,” he says.

The group received more than 80 designs from 18 different countries around the world. Industry experts chosen to represent an objective selection process judged the entries. Winners were recognized in four categories: Best Student Project, Best Professional Project, Best Use of Aluminum, and Best Use of Autodesk Fusion 360, an integrated 3D computer-aided design (CAD)/computer-aided manufacturing (CAM) tool for product development that powers industrial design, mechanical engineering, and manufacturing with cloud-based collaboration.

Winners were awarded a $2,000 cash prize for their ingenuity. The Best Use of Fusion 360 category prize also comes with a full pass to Autodesk University 2016 and a $1,000 travel stipend. This year’s winners included:

The Best Use of Aluminum category was newly added this year. “We’re thrilled to support a certification program and design challenge that motivates the next generation of designers to incorporate sustainable practices,” Alice Truscott, program manager for the Alcoa Foundation, said in a statement.

The institute created this design challenge as an opportunity to develop resources to engage, inform, and inspire emerging designers and students to join the design-led revolution.

“The key to these innovations is cradle to cradle design—considering and determining in the design stage if a material will enter the biological nutrient cycle, or will be utilized in the technical nutrient cycle, and also ensuring that those materials are safe from a chemistry perspective,” Perkins says. “This is the foundation of circularity and value retention.”