Posts Tagged ‘waste’
Brewery’s Bio Energy Plant
Posted in Models by Kate Archdeacon on July 30th, 2010
Source: Food Climate Research Network (FCRN)
Image: Hops by Susan Simon via flickr CC
The brewery Adnams has announced the completion of the construction phase of an anaerobic digestion (AD) plant, which will be the first in the UK to use brewery and local food waste to produce renewable gas for injection into the national gas grid as well as providing gas for use as a vehicle fuel. In partnership with British Gas and the National Grid, the facility will start injecting renewable gas into the gas grid later this summer. It is intended that the facility will produce enough renewable gas to power the Adnams brewery and run its fleet of lorries, while still leaving up to 60 per cent of the output for injection into the National Grid.
The Adnams Bio Energy plant consists of three digesters – sealed vessels in which naturally-occurring bacteria act without oxygen to break down up to 12,500 tonnes of organic waste each year. The result is the production of biomethane as well as a liquid organic fertiliser.
In addition, following an agreement with Centrica – the parent company of British Gas, Adnams Bio Energy has deployed British solar thermal panels and will shortly install cutting edge photovoltaic cells, which will in effect create a mini energy park.The deal will ensure that all of the site, including the Adnams Distribution Centre, will be using renewable energy generated on-site with some surplus energy available for export.
Read the full press release for more information.
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Daily Dump: Waste Management Design
Posted in Models by Kate Archdeacon on July 1st, 2010
Via Worldchanging
From the case study by Bryan Boyer & Justin W. Cook for Helsinki Design Lab:
With a background in entrepreneurship, and experience co-founding one of India’s leading design schools, Poonam Bir Kasturi was no stranger to big challenges when she began to take note of the amount of waste filling Bangalore’s streets. Running a business and even creating a new school from scratch were successful projects built on Kasturi’s creativity and intellect, but as structural challenges, they were known quantities—familiar institutions for which many models existed. To address her growing interest in Bangalore’s waste, Kasturi would have to redefine the boundaries of the problem, while also designing the right kind of approach to the challenge. With the ultimate goal of improving India’s ability to manage its waste, Kasturi created the Daily Dump, a business that offers composting and recycling products and services actionable on an individual level, yet primed for coordination in a larger network of action. In the wake of failures left by many top-heavy, centralized approaches to waste management, The Daily Dump’s bottom-up, instant on solution is a powerful alternative.
At a basic level, the efficacy of waste management depends on three key factors: the attitude of individuals, the practices that those individuals engage in, and the extent to which municipal services enable and support these practices and attitudes. Failure in any one of these areas damages a community’s ability to manage their waste. Similarly, isolated accomplishments within one part of the system will not yield significant results without coordinated accomplishments on the other factors.
The Daily Dump was born out of recognition that Bangalore was a messier city for all of its growth and that the municipality and various NGOs attempting to fix the situation were stumbling. Due to evident corruption and bureaucratic sluggishness, efforts to enhance the centralized waste infrastructure were deemed by Kasturi as an important long-term effort, but one in need of a more immediate counterpart.
With municipal services faltering, Kasturi’s focus turned to attitudes and practices. The Daily Dump was established as a for-profit social enterprise in order to give the organization a high degree of flexibility in pursuing their goal of improving urban waste management in India. Free from any obligation to donors, the organization is able to change tack quickly to act on opportunities as they emerge. Using the market as a persistent reality check, the growth of the Daily Dump comes at a relatively slow pace but is fundamentally durable and road tested.
From the outset, the Daily Dump was designed as a business with three critical aspects: it would promote waste management generally rather than its own products, it would provide education in addition to tools, and it would offer a “clone” model which allows like-minded parties to duplicate the business.
Read the full case study on Helsinki Design Lab.
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Exchange for Change: Ethical Sustainable Fashion
Posted in Events, Models by Kate Archdeacon on June 25th, 2010
Oxfam Australia and CarriageWorks presents Exchange for Change: The festival for a fashionable world without poverty
The latest kicks, those perfect fitting jeans, that jaw-dropping dress. We all have fashion cravings. But often our fashion sense has a flow-on effect that we don’t get to see. What are our clothes made of? Who makes them? Under what conditions? Could we be making better choices – more eco-friendly, people-friendly choices? Oxfam Australia and CarriageWorks are delighted to join forces to present a series of events that examine the workings of the fashion industry. Exchange for Change celebrates the positive steps many have made to address the environmental impacts of clothing production, as well as fair wages and safe working conditions for the people who make our clothes. Above all, the three day event will focus on what we can do in our everyday lives to make a difference.
Stitched together with a lineup of live local music, and wintry treats from the CarriageWorks café and bar, this is an event for anyone ready to evolve their fashion sense. The 3-day event features discussions, a designer showcase, and one of Sydney’s biggest clothing swaps – all for free!
Waste-chain innovation: Animal Dung Paper
Posted in Models by Kate Archdeacon on June 23rd, 2010
Source: Worldchanging
From “From Muck to Riches: Waste-Chain Innovation in India” by Anna da Costa:
In recent years, elephant dung has grown in popularity as a niche substrate for paper that avoids the felling of trees. It is now used in a variety of countries, including Sri Lanka, Thailand, South Africa and India. Not only is it environmentally sound and based on a free material from Jaipur’s significantly sized elephant herd, but the paper can be sold at a premium. The dung is collected from stables around Jaipur. It is then washed thoroughly in a tank of water. The waste water from this stage is rich with nutrients, and goes to local farmers for use as an effective natural fertiliser. Meanwhile, the remaining fibre is cooked with salt for four to five hours to soften and clean it further and then washed in hydrogen peroxide to ensure that no bacteria remain. The dung is then dried in the sun and any non-usable fibre removed by hand.
Today, it is not just elephant-dung paper that has made it onto the market. Mahima Mehra (Haathi Chaap) is experimenting with camel muck, while Scandinavians are making elk-dung paper and an Australian company is experimenting with kangaroo waste. This story is one of an increasing number around India inspiring hope in the potential for waste-chain innovation and the creation of green jobs, where waste and recycling are predicted to become two of the next economic-boom areas for India.
Read the full article by Anna da Costa.
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Zero Carbon Britain 2030: Report
Posted in Research by Kate Archdeacon on June 22nd, 2010
zerocarbonbritain2030 provides political and economic solutions to the urgent challenges raised by the climate science, outlining how we can transform the UK into an efficient, clean, prosperous zero-carbon society. Covering energy, transport, land use, the built environment and industry, each chapter of the report has been written by bringing together the UK’s leading thinkers in their field including policy makers, scientists, academics, industry and NGOs.
zerocarbonbritain2030 is a fully integrated solution to climate change. It examines how we can meet our electricity and heating requirements through efficient service provision, while still decreasing carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide and other emissions.
The report starts by examining the current “Context” in the Climate Science and Energy Security chapters. It then moves on to how we can “PowerDown” heat and electricity demand largely through new technology, efficient design and behaviour change. The “Land Use & Agriculture” section considers the tremendous potential of the land not only to decrease emissions but also to sequester residual emissions. We then move on to how we can “PowerUp” through the use of renewable technology. Finally we examine the policy that can help bring this about and the job creation that will come with it, in the “Framework, policy and economics” section.
A full copy of the new report is available as a free pdf , or buy a printed copy from the Centre for Alternative Technology.
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FoodLoop: Design-Led Social Enterprise
Posted in Models by Kate Archdeacon on June 10th, 2010
Source: Worldchanging
From “Food Loop: A Design-Led Social Enterprise for Localized Composting” by John Thackara:
Cities such as London face three environmental and social challenges. First, biodegradable waste in landfill causes methane, a greenhouse gas 23 times more powerful than carbon dioxide. Second, although about 50 percent of some inner city London boroughs are comprised of flats, many councils struggle to carry out waste separation in any dwelling that is not a single house. And third, about 20,000 people live in temporary accommodation for homeless people – but their social needs are so acute that of the 79 percent who want to return to work, only seven percent of them manage to do so.
FoodLoop is a design-led social enterprise for the localized composting of biodegradable waste on housing estates. It greens housing estates, and transforms unused and often wasted spaces of inner city council housing into rich and flourishing social and agricultural spaces.
The service, which is designed to be staffed by disadvantaged people, creates compost from waste using a specially designed community composting machine, the The Rocket Composter, and provides a door-to-door service from inner-city flats. As well as dealing with waste collection and management, FoodLoop workers will learn gardening and landscaping skills, using the compost to cultivate fruit and vegetable plants on communal areas of the estate.
The first FoodLoop project is up and running on a housing estate in Camden Town in London where the service is currently being run by the East London Community Recycling Partnership. The composter was installed in September, and the team has started food planting.
FoodLoop is available to other local authorities as a blueprinted system for the localized composting of biodegradable waste on housing estates. There are also plans to launch FoodLoop, with its accumulating expertise concerning the development of services for organic waste management, in the Middle East and South East Asia.
Read the article by John Thackara via Worldchanging’s Attention Philanthropy 2010
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Compost Cab: Food Scraps Pick-Up Service
Posted in Models by Kate Archdeacon on May 28th, 2010
Source: Springwise
…For every 50 pounds of organics the company collects, customers can receive five pounds of fresh compost and one pound of worm castings in exchange.
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Read it on Springwise:
The average American family produces more than 500 pounds of leftover organic material every year; composting not only keeps that waste out of methane-generating landfills, it also produces nutrient-rich, fertile, natural soil. Composting may be the right thing to do for the environment, but it can be hard to get around the smell and the mess—particularly for urbanites without expansive yards. Compost Cab is a new service about to launch in Washington, DC, that can be called upon to handle all the dirty details.
DC-area consumers begin by signing up online. Once it launches, Compost Cab will then provide them with a standardized bin equipped with a sturdy, compostable bag liner. Each day clients will fill the bin with their organic material, and once a week—on a reliable, fuel-efficient schedule—Compost Cab will pick up the bag, leaving behind only a clean bin with a new liner. The cost is simply USD 8 per week per bin; no long-term commitments are required. Compost Cab’s primary composting partner is Engaged Community Offshoots (ECO), a seed-stage urban farm in College Park, Md., that uses finished compost to grow natural, nutritious food for local kids.
At least as interesting is that clients who have been with Compost Cab for nine months or longer can claim some finished soil in return. Specifically, for every 50 pounds of organics the company collects from them, they can receive five pounds of fresh compost and one pound of worm castings in exchange. Those who choose not to claim their share, meanwhile, can ask Compost Cab to donate it on their behalf to ECO. Compost Cab is a production of Agricity LLC, a Washington, DC-based company focused on sustainability.
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Effective Use of Substandard Local Vegetables
Posted in Models by Kate Archdeacon on May 14th, 2010
Source: Japan for Sustainability
The government of Kumamoto Prefecture in southern Japan has launched a project that introduces substandard agricultural products produced in the prefecture to box-lunch shops in business districts in Osaka Prefecture in western Japan. Kumamoto Prefecture’s Osaka office has led this project, called the “Mottainai Project” (‘mottainai’ literally means ‘not wasting what is valuable’), and started it in earnest in 2010.
The prefectural government began this project on a trial basis in 2008 in cooperation with a shop that sells box lunches and set meals in the same building as its Osaka office. In this shop, vegetables and fruits that used to be discarded, mainly due to scars on them or irregularities in their size, were experimentally sold at display counters that had been clear after lunchtime. These agricultural products were better received than expected, because of their low cost, tastiness, and novelty. As for tomatoes in particular, as much as five tons were sold in less than a four-month period, with sales of about one million yen (U.S.$10,870).
In this project, farmers can distribute substandard vegetables and fruits to shops in small amounts, while shops can make effective use of vacant counters, and also can use vegetables and fruits for box lunches and other meals if they are left unsold. The project is well-received, as it involves little risk for the farmers and shops and brings additional profits to both. So far, 15 local food stores and farmers have distributed such farm products to Osaka, and 38 farmers have showed an interest in doing so.
The prefectural government’s Osaka office also plans to hold a food exhibition for box-lunch shop owners to allow them to see and taste-test substandard vegetables, with the aim of enhancing the network with Kumamoto Prefecture and acquiring new vendors in the Osaka metropolitan area.
Read the full article on japanfs.
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Grocery Waste Reduction Targets: Courtauld Commitment [2]
Posted in Movements by Kate Archdeacon on April 29th, 2010
Source: Food Climate Research Network
Image: scrapthispack via flickr CC
The Courtauld Commitment (UK) is a voluntary agreement aimed at improving resource efficiency and reducing the carbon and wider environmental impact of the grocery retail sector. Phase 2 follows the original Courtauld Commitment (Phase 1), launched in 2005. At the launch of the Commitment (Phase 2) on 4th March 2010, 29 major retailers and brand owners had already pledged their commitment to this voluntary agreement. Using 2009 data and working to a 2012 deadline, Courtauld Commitment 2 moves away from solely weight-based targets and aims to achieve more sustainable use of resources over the entire lifecycle of products, throughout the whole supply chain.
The three new targets are:
* Packaging – to reduce the weight, increase recycling rates and increase the recycled content of all grocery packaging, as appropriate. Through these measures the aim is to reduce the carbon impact of this grocery packaging by 10%.
* Household food and waste – to reduce UK household food and drink wastes by 4%.
* Supply chain product and packaging waste – to reduce traditional grocery product and packaging waste in the grocery supply chain by 5% – this includes both solid and liquid wastes.
The original Courtauld Commitment has succeeded in stopping growth in packaging despite increases in both sales and population in the UK. Some 500,000 tonnes less packaging was used over the period 2005 – 2009 – that’s enough waste to fill a queue of refuse trucks, bumper-to-bumper, stretching from Southampton to Newcastle.
Liz Goodwin, WRAP CEO, said: “One of the biggest challenges society faces over the next decade is reducing the environmental impact of the things we buy. This new agreement will bring about changes ranging from more efficient methods of production right through to the impact of household consumption.”
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Plastic Bag Tax: Consumption Drops By 19 Million
Posted in Models by Kate Archdeacon on April 21st, 2010
Source: Treehugger
Image: samuel mann via flickr CC
From Plastic Bags Used in DC Drops From 22 Million to 3 Million a Month by Brian Merchant.
Washington DC’s 5 cent tax on plastic bags, instated just this past January, has already proven to have a phenomenal impact: the number of plastic bags handed out by supermarkets and other establishments dropped from the 2009 monthly average of 22.5 million to just 3 million in January. While significantly reducing plastic waste, the tax simultaneously generated $150,000 in revenue, which will be used to clean up the Anacostia River.
Council member Tommy Wells (D-Ward 6), sponsor of the bag tax bill, said the new figures show that city residents are adapting to the law far more quickly than he or other city officials had expected.
The tax, one of the first of its kind in the nation, is designed to change consumer behavior and limit pollution in the Chesapeake Bay watershed. Under regulations created by the D.C. Department of the Environment, bakeries, delicatessens, grocery stores, drugstores, convenience stores, department stores and any other “business that sells food items” must charge the tax on paper or plastic bags.
I love this–I really do. A simple 5 cent tax–with revenues going towards an environmental cause voters rallied around–and consumer behavior is changed for the better in a truly big way. I love that 5 cents, which makes up a tiny percentage of total cost of your purchase even if you were just buying a bag of chips and a beverage, was enough to make consumers reconsider taking a plastic bag.
We’re going to have to wait to see if this trend continues, of course, but the results are nothing short of stunning so far–there are 19 million less plastic bags in a landfill because of this tax.
Let’s hope other municipalities–and dare I suggest, states?–are paying attention.
See the full article by Brian Merchant on Treehugger.
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