Romare Antrobus

New York disposes 20,000 tons of single-use unrecyclable plastic foodware each year that ultimately ends up in landfills, incinerators, or as litter scattered across city streets, parks, beaches, and waterways. But what if our packaging could be grown to regenerate our ecosystems instead of polluting it?

Dr. Romare Antrobus, founder of Roseau, is doing just that. As a biomaterials engineer, Romare has spent 7 years leveraging the power of microbial fermentation to develop a platform technology for high performance, regenerative materials, including home compostable nanocellulose-based containers, wrappers, and utensils created from NYC agro-industrial waste (think: kombucha, but the film on top becomes a bio-based material shaped into packaging). This material is uniquely backyard compostable in just 15 days and is designed to work with the city’s community and curbside composting systems. Romare has already taken his innovation from lab to prototypes with support from the National Science Foundation, National Geographic Society, and Columbia University. Now, he’s working to scale production and promote New York’s circular economy using local brewery and juice byproducts to produce the biomaterial. Roseau is more than a new material innovation - it’s a homegrown supply chain model rooted in science, equity, and sustainability.