Coming from the inland plains of Saskatoon, Sask., Raj Behari never knew much about oysters and they were far from something he'd ever order at a restaurant.
But after moving to Victoria over a year ago, Behari not only had his taste buds opened up to fresh shellfish, he had his mind opened up to the incredible creatures oysters are and their vast array of environmental and nutritional benefits.
The only downfall was that the son of two circular economy entrepreneurs couldn't help but notice the masses of shells restaurants were left with after the oysters' edible portion gets eaten up.
“Nature is creating this beautiful product for us and we’re just putting it in the garbage,” he said in an interview.
It's helped inspire Behari to create Shellter, a startup looking to capture value from restaurants' discarded oyster shells by turning them into useful bulk products, such as nutrient-rich compost and road de-icer.
Instead of the current economy's model where products end up as trash and that waste creates a host of other problems, he's always wanted to run a circular-minded business that's more representative of how nature actually works.
“The future is going to look so different, we’re not just going to be throwing things away. We have to return to the earth what is from the earth, we have to return to the sea what is from the sea,” he said.
The oyster shell-infused compost and road de-icer are both still in the product-development phase, with Behari bootstrapping the company's groundwork from his downtown apartment. He works at the oyster-slinging bar Shuck Taylor's, which has been the source for his stockpile of shells.
Back at his apartment, he removes solid organic bits with a screwdriver before washing the oyster casings in his bathroom tub. After the shells are clean, he grinds them into a fine powder.
The plan is to mix the pulverized shells with used coffee grounds in a fast-acting compost machine Behari has access to thanks to another venture. The hope is oyster shells, which are a more basic on the pH scale, will balance out the acidic coffee to make a soil product rich in nutrients that could be a boon to local greenhouses growing calcium-dependant veggies such as peppers and cucumbers.
The entrepreneur is hoping to bring on a chemical engineer to help with the road de-icer concept, which would see the crushed shells mixed in a vinegar solution. Behari said the goal is to create a natural alternative that wouldn't impact local waterways like typical road salt does.
“If you were using something on the streets that was benefiting the local ecosystem instead of hurting it, that would be pretty valuable,” he said.
Behari has always felt connected to nature and he draws a lot of his inspiration from its beauty. He hopes to one day look back on his endeavours and see them read like a "love letter" to planet. In that mission, oysters are an ideal partner as Behari points to their many environmental benefits.
Oysters can enhance water quality as they can filter about 200 litres every day, a process that allows for more sunlight to shine on ocean species such as kelp and also helps reduce air pollution as the shellfish use carbon to build their shells.
Behari noted they're also a sustainable protein source and putting the shells back in the water increases the settlement and survival rates of shellfish larvae – though he said doing so is tightly regulated in Canada. Projects in the United States, Australia and Hong Kong have been collecting discarded oyster shells from restaurants and returning them to the water to restore reefs or make new shellfish colonies.
“These oysters are playing a super vital ecological role in creating habitat, providing food; they also buffer coastal erosion so that’s going to help in the fight against climate change," the Shellter founder said.
“If I were to die tomorrow, I’d want to know I left this world a better place than how I found it.”
