Waste Management, how we manage waste products we create and what we can do ourselves in this process

Waste Management

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Keywords

Waste, manangement, removal, landfill, recycling, chemical, industrial, domestic, commercial, household waste, fertiliser, farming, restaurant, medical.

Introduction

What is waste? It is the by-product of what we eat (in terms of us going to the toilet), and things like left-over food that we have to deal with and sort out. But how?

Types of Waste

There are many types of waste, including:

domestic: this is our everyday household waste. It includes what we send down the toilet when we flush, as well as food waste, the things we throw away in the bin, which is collected by the bin men every other week, and anything we could recycle.
industrial: this is a type of waste that is created by industrial units. It includes stronger items and liquids that are used by companies, but are no longer wanted.
agricultural: agricultural waste. Doesn't sound right, as it's usually all natural, but there are some things that are not reused in the field (pun intended), including crop residues like husk and straw, farm animal waste, and various chemicals that are used by farmers to control their crops, etc.
commercial: so you go to a restaurant for a nice meal, and you don't eat everything on the plate. Before that plate even gets to you, there is waste in terms of left-over food that wasn't prepared, but the food you leave on the plate is also waste. Other types of waste in this area include anything that a commercial building uses - even hospitals and medical institutions have waste (think of all that PPE that we used in Covid lockdowns).

The earliest account of recycling rubbish was in 1031 in Japan. They found a way to recycle paper and sell it on as new in shops.

Here is a YouTube video from Supply Chain Sustainability School on waste management:

Biodegradable vs Non-Biodegradable

What do these two terms means? Well, biodegradable means that it can be reduced down to organic matter levels naturally. This includes things like our food waste, newspapers and paper in general, vegetable matter. They all undergo a rotting process during a small length of time.

Compare that with non-biodegradable materials. They include things like plastic bottles, glass, aluminium cans (like a Pepsi or Coke can), iron nails and other materials that do not break down naturally.

We have resources that can help there, and they include:

Recycling plants: they allow us to recycle plastics and make new things, such as more plastic bottles. CDs can also be shredded down, and turned into roads.
Compost bins: believe it or not, but you can do your own recycling by starting a compost bin. This is where you can put both green and brown materials in, and let nature do it's thing. Insects and underground critters that decompose organic matter can reduce it down into compost for use as a natural alternative to soil, and which will help improve your soil you already have.
Landfill: although not strictly a method to reduce carbon emissions, or reduce that amount of waste we have, they do serve a purpose. We should only be using landfill once everything else that can be done (recycling, removal of anything that can be broken down or reused) is done, and there is no other alternative.
Incinerators: a bio-incinerator allows us to burn organic materials down and reuse them for heating, or as fuels.
Biomass generators: these, along with the incinerators above, can burn biomass and turn it into fuels.

Resources

Waste management
chart

Facts about
recycling

Recycling

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Keywords

Recycling, plastic, logo, reuse, reduce, biological, non-biological.

Introduction

We all make waste. This can be anything from plastic bottles, to tin cans, to things we cannot recycle. But just what is recycling?

Recycling Process

In essence, when we use a plastic bottle, for instance, we should be putting it into a recycling cycle with our local council (for me, that is a plastic recycling sack, and it goes to our local binmen). It then goes to a processing plant where it is sorted, and placed into a line where it is reused.

The plastic types are sorted, and then melted down to a liquid, so it can be reshaped. This can then be reused as a plastic bottle again, or for other things. They can make road surfaces out of old CDs, shopping bags, ocean-friendly dog collars made from ocean plastic, or even rugs and mats made entirely from recycled material.

Why is Recycling Important?

OK, so the main purpose of the recycling logo was to make people aware that they can Reduce, Reuse and Recycle the items that were labelled with it. Although this is still present, the main logo has not changed since its design in 1970 by a 23-year old student. It has had many adaptations through the years, but the principal of the logo remains.

The guy that designed the recycling logo was given $2,000 to make the design, and also made the design out of old arrows and arc from a previous presentation he had lying around, making the logo true to its name.

Recycling is important for many reasons. They include:

Reduces landfill waste: landfill comes at a cost. We generate enough food waste and other waste materials to fill plenty of landfill, but once this has been filled, then what happens? We need more. Recycling reduces this.

Conservation of natural resources: our natural resources include wood from trees, and metals that need mining. If we continue to cut down all the trees for paper or other uses, we will run out. It costs a lot of money to mine for metal, whereas using the metal we already have can reduce this cost, and also help the environment.

It saves energy: making products from recyclable materials saves energy. For an example, it takes 95% less energy and cost to make a new aluminium can from an old one through this process. We don't then have to mine for the aluminium raw material, which is quite a costly process.

It creates jobs: no matter which way you look at it, recycling creates jobs, from the people who collect and sort your recyclables, to the people who process it at the factories, to the people who then reuse it and make new items from the recyclable material that is left.

It can save money: in the example of the aluminium can, it is markedly cheaper to produce from the recycled materials than it is to mine for new aluminium. There is no loss of quality, and manufacturing costs are lower, and the consumer saves money.

Here is a YouTube video from Greening Vermillion on recycling:

Biological Recycling

Recycling isn't just contained with plastics and cardboard and other non-living materials. It can also be our own wastes, and other biological material that can be reused through different processes. We can reuse our own bodily fluids such as urine to be reprocessed as water. Our faeces can be turned into fertiliser, which in turn can be used to supply anaerobic respiration. There are companies out there that deal with these processes, and purchase them to help with recycling.

Resources

The recycle logo

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