AUSTIN (KXAN) — A dirty diaper may be gross to you, but one Texas company believes it could be the secret ingredient to helping answer an environmental question: How do we clean up all of our plastic waste? Hiro Industries hopes these diapers could help solve the plastic crisis. (Eric Henrikson/KXAN) "It's estimated that 7 billion tons of plastic have already been created, and over 400 million tons get added every year. So it's just a global mega problem," Tero Isokauppila with Hiro Technologies explained to Nexstar's KXAN. The Finnish farmer partnered with Miki Agrawal to help solve this problem. They say the solution can be found in baby poop. Agrawal has built a career out of stuff most people don't like talking about. She founded the bidet company Tushy and the women's underwear line Thinx. Now, she and Isokauppila have a new start-up: the aforementioned Hiro Technologies. Named for Agrawal's son, the company is looking to fungi, grown in a dirty diaper, to eat plastic in landfills. The plastic problem and diapers According to Healthline, a baby typically uses around 3,000 diapers a year. The World Economic Forum estimates that 300,000 disposable diapers are sent to landfills every minute. All those diapers contain plastic in various forms. A report filed by the McArthur Foundation estimated that the diaper industry burns through 248 million barrels of crude oil a year. "When you give birth, it's the most intimate, beautiful, poignant experience, and then you're just going through so much waste, and there's this, like, sort of whiplash," Agrawal said. Plastic itself is filling landfills at an alarming rate. The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) said that over the past 65 years, plastic production has gone from two million metric tons a year to 450 million metric tons. Diapers can take five hundred years to decompose, according to the OCED. (Eric Henrikson/KXAN)Coffee cups can take thirty years to decompose, according to the OCED. (Eric Henrikson/KXAN)Plastic bags can take twenty years to decompose, according to the OCED. (Eric Henrikson/KXAN) Plastic doesn't dissolve quickly or efficiently. The World Wildlife Fund estimates that a single plastic straw takes 200 years to decompose. "Plastics are increasing exponentially, and we have no end-of-life solution to them. We're just punting that into the next generations," Isokauppila said. Crappy solution It all comes down to fungi. Think mushrooms or mold: Fungi have been on our planet for billions of years and have evolved to eat anything to survive. Scientists are turning to fungi to solve the plastic issue. In 2024, scientists in Germany found a plastic-eating fungi species. Isokauppila said his team found several other species as well. Scientists with Hiro Industries decomposed a diaper into soil using fungi over six months. (Eric Henrikson/KXAN) These fungi consume plastic by eating lignin, a substance found in trees that is used in many types of plastic. Growing this fungus requires fertilizer. Enter baby poop. The Hiro Industries team is developing a diaper that, once used, can serve as the breeding ground for this fungi. A small pouch comes with the diaper, which can be tossed into the dirty diaper during changing. This pouch feeds off of the poop and then grows, consuming the diaper and any surrounding plastics. Since diapers end up in landfills, they could help clean up the plastic in these landfills. The team tested multiple types of diapers to see if urine, poop, or a combo of both would make growth challenging. They found that the chemicals in urine didn't interfere with the fungi growth, but helped provide a moist environment. Launching a brand This week, Hiro Industries launched its Kickstarter in hopes of funding the project. As part of the campaign, they're offering an at-home science kit that shows how the fungi consume plastic. "It's safe, easy, and you can see with your own naked eyes of how plastic gets broken down," Isokauppila said. This at home kit shows how fungi consume plastic. (Eric Henrikson/KXAN) While the idea of using diapers to solve a crisis might turn many off, Agrawal said that it is actually an opportunity. "When things are weird or awkward for culture, there is the opportunity to change culture, to bring culture forward, to get them to learn about something new," she said. The diapers are scheduled to launch in February 2025.