Green

Give us your Clothes

Clothes are often one of the most overlooked items for recycling. Most of us either give them to our younger siblings or throw them away. If you want to put a figure to the wastage try 190,000 tons. That’s how much of clothes end in New York landfills alone. That is a shame if you think about it. Clothes can be recycled or even given away to charity.

New York City is trying to do something positive about this issue. From September of this year, 50 collection bins will be placed throughout the city in an attempt cajole the public to do something positive. The bins will be located in high traffic areas in order to achieve maximum visibility and accessibility.

NYC has called for bids from non-profit companies who are willing to come on board for a 10-15 year period. Goodwill Industries International is one of the companies that are interested in the venture. Goodwill appears to want the clothes for reselling purposes as many items are hardly damaged or require very little mending. They also appear to have methods to recycle even tattered pieces of clothing. It is expected that over half the donations will be of resalable nature, most of the rest used in the automotive industry as well as the insulation industry. What remains is projected to be only about five percent of the original volume and that is what will finally end up in a landfill.

If the project kicks off well and finds success, other states are soon set to follow NYC’s example.

Bag Company in Trouble

Biodegradable plastic bags seem to be the solution thus far for part of the plastic problem. In Australia, Goody Environment claimed to have hit upon that solution and vigorously promoted its product. Al seemed to be going well, until now.

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission is taking Goody Environment and its distributor NuPak to courts over false claims. The commission claims that both companies were engaged in making false representations regarding their product. Goody has responded by saying that they stand behind their product all the way. In fact they are quite confident that the courts will see things their way.

The confidence mainly stems from independent testing results as well as the Australian Standards compliance statement that they possess for the product. However, further investigation has revealed that the statement is not valid for the plastic bags. In fact Flinders University, where the tests were conducted, has stated that the tests were carried out on potato sacks produced by the company and not the plastic bags in question. The university has requested the company to remove the statement displayed on the website.

Further damning evidence was produced by a Belgian company which carried out testing on the bags. They discovered that the bags had not even begun deteriorating after 12 weeks. Going by Goody’s claims, the bag should have completely turned to compost at that point. Goody has responded to this by saying that this is all a result of a witch-hunt conducted by competitors.

The worrying factor, though, is that over 60 million bags were distributed in the country on the strength of Goody’s claims.

Deadly lead in Nigerian village

One hundred and sixty three. That is the number of lives that were lost before any action was taken to save a village from lead poisoning in Nigeria. What is worse is that children began to die of the toxic lead in January and only now is anything being done about it.

The Blacksmith Institute is an environmental engineering organization and is a global leader in cleaning up polluted sites. They were asked to casually check out the village of Dareta for toxins, which is just a collection of mud huts, when the horrific discovery was made. At the time they were engaged in cleaning up a site in Senegal. That site too was saturated with toxic lead, but only 18 people had died there due to it in the past few years.

The discovery in Dareta was so horrific that the small team that arrived there decided to stay and help clean up the land. The levels of lead found in the soil were 10,000 parts per million. Compare this to the acceptable levels of 400 parts to a million, and the severity of the issue becomes evident. The cause for the high levels has been traced to the men of the village who function as gold miners. The metal ore they bring from the mines is then crushed by the women and children. The lead that is prevalent with gold ore, then finds its way into the soil.

Currently, the institute is training the villagers on how to clear the lead. The men have been issued protective suits to help them clean up the soil. That operation consists solely of removing the topsoil, packing it into plastic bags and burying far away from the village. However, they are hampered by having to use their crude tools such as metal hoes, the impending rainy season and the complete lack of any government support.

What is even more shocking than this is that six more villages like Dareto have been identified. None of them have received any support, government or otherwise.

Good News on Waste Emissions

A Brussels based European Environment Agency (EEA) report has delivered some good news in relation to European waste emission levels. The 634 page report gives an overview of the period ranging from 1990 to 2007 and enables all interested parties to understand the situation at hand.

European waste accounts for 2.6 percent of all greenhouse gas emissions and over the seventeen year period analyzed, a thirty nine percent decrease has been achieved. Waste disposal on land was the largest contributor to emissions, but that too had fallen forty six percent in the specified period. In the EU-15, sixty five percent of greenhouse gasses emanated from waste and of that, methane emissions from stood at 1.7 percent. The UK and Germany were the biggest producers of methane at 29.1 percent and 11.8 percent, but those figures represented the biggest improvements in any of the member states. The UK achieved a fifty nine percent reduction and Germany achieved a whopping seventy seven percent in methane emission reductions.

The drive towards reducing the amount of biodegradable materials ending up in landfills by EU member states has been identified as the primary reason for the drop. The total drop in that sector stood at thirty five percent. The UK was singled out as the best nation in methane recovery, as they recovered seventy three percent of all methane produced in the country in 2007.

The report suggests that the is EU on track to achieve the targets set by the Kyoto Protocol .

Recycling Ipods and Mobile Phones

Recycling a mobile phone or any other gadget that you are no longer using is far better than just throwing it away or leaving it lying around. The first benefit, which is the most obvious, is to get some money in return for your old, unused mobile phone. The newer models will bring you more money.

Choosing to recycle your old IPod is clearly a way of helping the environment. Even if your mobile phone or other gadgets do not work, you can still recycle them as their parts can be reused. By reusing old parts, new resources and fossil fuels need not be used in order to produce brand new parts.

Recycling an old phone is similar to having it reused. In developing countries, old phones are refurbished and then sold. This is useful for those who cannot afford to buy themselves brand new mobile phones. While this method not only benefits the environment, saving it from pollution, it also helps to build a more advanced and widespread telecommunications infrastructure.

You might be one of those people who get a new phone every two years, as per your mobile phone contract. If so, then your old phone becomes a spare phone and then slowly forgotten and unused.

It is now, at this instance, that you need to find it and hand it over to a recycling service. FoneHub, is one particularly good mobile recycling service. First specify the model of your phone and then look for the quoted price of the phone you are recycling. Some websites might even ask you for an IMEI number. This is usually found under the battery.

Apart from recycling your old phone, you can also send in hands free kits, Bluetooth headsets and even travel chargers.

Steel And Concrete from Demolition Sites in the Dubai to be Recycled

According to reports received recently, efforts made in Dubai to recycle steel and concrete from demolition sites are being wasted due to contractors refusing to opt for recycled building material produced in the UAE itself. The contractors seem to not take too much interest in the environmental benefits derived from using such material. It takes around 10 dirhams for every truckload of construction-related waste to be dumped in a landfill.
The UAE currently has two recycling plants for turning demolition and construction waste into construction materials. Environmental experts say that using recycled construction material produced locally can assist towards cutting down on CO2 emissions – also helping buildings cut back on their environmental impact.

The boom years in Dubai witnessed a production of 11 million tones of construction-related waste per year, according to Neil Roberts, CEO, Emirates Recycling. With the current rate of construction waste production at 20%, the impact on the environment is still huge.

Emirates Recycling’s Construction and Demolition Waste is able to recycle over 500 truckloads or 3 million tones of construction waste per year.
Having the recycling plants and the recycled material is all worthless if it is not going to be used. Turning the construction waste into CDW (waste generated from processing plants and new building sites and concrete waste) does not complete the full sequence of recycling unless it is actually used.

Experts say the UAE needs a policy change with regards to construction and the use of recycled, locally produced material – encouraging builders towards reusing recycled CDW. Another initiative could be government incentives persuading companies to embrace more environmentally friendly practices.

Recycling Cigarette Butts

Recycling is generally all about garbage, glass bottles, newspapers and so on and so forth. A new study however talks about expanding on the practice of recycling miniscule items such as cigarette butts.

Termed as ‘tiny trash’, also cited in the report as an item of garbage found almost anywhere and everywhere – the study outlines ways and means of recycling cigarette butts. Reusing cigarette butts can be done to prevent the corrosion of steel, which incidentally causes big time oil producers an annual sum of a few million dollars. The study’s findings are featured in the ACS’ Industrial and Engineering Chemistry Research.

The study was carried out by a team headed by Jun Zhao. In their report they state that annually, around 4.5 trillion cigarette butts are found amongst the trash. Cigarette butts are an eyesore, but other studies indicate even more. Cigarette butts also contain various toxic materials that are quite harmful towards the environment. Cigarette butts thrown into rivers and lakes are quite likely to kill fish as well. Recycling these cigarette butts is one fabulous way of solving these problems – and finding a practical use for it is an act that must be applauded.

The study states that cigarette butts when put in water and then applied onto N80 steel which is used fairly commonly in the oil industry, is a fabulous method of protecting it from corrosion, even under harsh weather conditions. This new find will mean that oil producers will save a lot of money spent otherwise on damages caused by corrosion, and even due to interruptions caused in the production cycle.

E-Waste – The Ugly Truth

Electronics are all the rage, not just in America, but all around the world; and it will continue to be so for many more years. With new products constantly being developed, who cannot resist getting themselves brand new fancy gadgets, be it an iPad or a funky mobile phone. The most important question is: how do you get rid of your old stuff?

Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) figures indicate that in 2007, the USA was responsible for turning out around 3 million tones of e-waste. Out of this, a mere 13.6% was recycled. What happened to the rest? It either ended up in landfills or was shipped across to third world countries. E-waste seems to be growing and growing, fuelling concern regarding health and the environment as well.

Toxins

Electronic items contain various toxins such as mercury, lead, beryllium and arsenic which are responsible for various health issues and even cancer. According to an official at the Natural Resources Defence Council (NDRC), a single electronic item has adequate toxins to seriously affect the health of one person. For example, a CRT monitor contains 4-8lbs of lead.

Taking this into consideration, do not just throw away electronic equipment like you do with normal garbage. If these items get into landfills, the toxins could seep into groundwater and eventually poison the water in the area – posing very serious health concerns. Incinerating it is even worse.
A report by the Government Accountability Office in 2008 indicated that an extensive amount of electronic equipment was sent across to third world countries such as India, Africa and China. In these countries, people tend to take these products apart using their bare hands, which, in turn exposes them to these harmful chemicals. Sometimes, such electronic items are found in unlined pits which means, the groundwater could get poisoned.
While legislation against exporting electronic waste does not exist as yet, it is currently being lobbied for; but until then, it lies in the hand of responsible e-recyclers.

Biodegradable Golf Balls

Being a golf player and environmentally friendly at the same time can be difficult. Take into consideration that in the US alone, around 300 million golf balls are discarded or lost, according to estimations. Then think of the discovery made by the Danish Golf Union’s research which indicates that a golf ball takes between 100-1,000 years to decompose under natural circumstances.

If your golf ball lands in a lake, then once it starts to disintegrate, it gradually releases fairly high levels of zinc into the water. To avert such a situation, a Spanish manufacturer of golf balls has a solution. His invention of an environmentally friendly golf ball might just solve the problem. This golf ball, once it hits the water, starts to dissolve – but that is not all; the golf ball’s inside contains fish food.

The manufacturer, Albert Buscato said that he invented this new environmentally friendly golf ball because he thought it would be a great way of improving on the biodegradable sporting equipment available in the market, which is of course limited.

This new golf ball, named Ecobioball has an outer layer of plastic polymer which is recyclable. This outer layer dissolves completely during the course of two days. The inner ball is made completely out of fish food.

The Ecobioball weighs in at 50.5g, which is a tad lighter than the average golf ball, but can be used for practice sessions. These golf balls are meant mainly for single use – which will bring down its price a fair amount.

Today’s Golfer’s David Connor however says the Ecobioball is far behind and is nowhere close to being a biodegradable golf ball of high quality. He cites this to the low performance associated with the Ecobioball, and says convincing golfers to actually purchase single use golf balls could prove to be quite a task.

$2 Million Raised at Green Auction

Earth Day’s 40th anniversary saw the Christie’s salesroom sporting a green carpet instead of the traditional red carpet, packed with celebrities, art collectors and environmentalists. The ‘Green Auction’ was an interesting one, and raked in a massive $2 million; with all proceeds going to an environmental charity.

Some of the items on auction included a Girard-Perragaux white gold and diamond encrusted watch, a Damien Hirst painting, a chance to play a game of golf with Bill Clinton and 18 other items. Stars like Chevy Chase and Salma Hayek were among the spirited bidders, while some preferred to remain anonymous. Chase was also the emcee at the auction.

The live auction was part of a collective event named ‘A Bid to Save the Earth’ which also included an online auction and other fund-raising activities. The proceeds from all these events will be split amongst environmental organizations such as Central Park Conservancy, Natural Resources Defence Council, Conservation International and Oceana.

A Central Park tour and lunch with actress Candice Bergen was one of the items up for auction while a six-person trip to Botswana, which would be guided by Nat Geo’s Chief Editor, reached $150,000. The golf date with Clinton was won for a $80,000.

Other celebrities at the Green Auction included Ted Danson, Sam Waterston, Matt Lauer and Brian Williams.

The online silent auction racked up around $500,000 with Christie’s saying it could top the $1 million mark when it closes on May 6th.

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