Eliminate Your Carbon Footprint With A Bamboo Bicycle

When you think about an eco-friendly mode of transport the first image that will flash before your eyes is probably a bicycle. True, perhaps you wouldn’t be adding noxious fumes to the atmosphere by switching up four wheels for two but what we never notice is how much the environment suffers whenever one bicycle is created. From the metal framework to the rubber tyres, factories across the planet are spewing harmful by-products left, right and centre so people can enjoy the feeling of ‘going green.’

In a very Christmas-y fashion, the answer to this problem came from the son of a carpenter. Vijay Sharma, was credited with the invention of the world’s first bamboo bicycle in 2009. The bicycle, more commonly known as the Bambike is an entirely natural take on the original vehicle. The framework is constructed from bamboo and the structure is held together by hemp fibre. The wheels too are bamboo and act as natural shock absorbers.

Bamboo doesn’t look like the sturdiest material to support a human weight but it’s actually quite the opposite. The whole bike while incredibly light is surprisingly durable, during a Japanese industrial test for bicycles it withstood 2,00,000 vibrations without breaking a sweat. Despite the simplicity of the material, Vijay has not chosen to mass produce the bikes or sell them in India and the last 20 were sold to cycle enthusiasts overseas in 2015. When asked why, Vijay says, “People in India have a perception that bamboo is a cheap material and therefore the bike will be cheaper than a traditional metal bike but this is a handcrafted bicycle and not a factory-manufactured product,” So perhaps you won’t be getting your own Bambike anytime soon but it’s good to know that we still have champions of the environment out there innovating for the future.