Drinking Straw Art – Fantasy on a Full Moon

Fantasy on a Full Moon is an art wall mural made from drinking straws and displayed at the Esplanade a few months back. The plastic drinking straws are transformed into animal shapes such as dragons, snails and prawns. We find it really amazing how it’s possible to reuse plastic straws for art. Here are some photos of the wall mural and animal art.

Green Drinks Singapore – Jan 2010

January 28, 2010
8:15 pm	to	9:30 pm

From Green Drinks Singapore:

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Venue: Naive, 99 East Coast Road

This month, we are gathering all the green groups, societies, businesses and individuals with green values to talk about their plans for 2010, and explore ways we can all work together.

In particular, we are targetting to have ECO (Singapore), SEC, Nature Society (Singapore), Vegetarian Society (Singapore), Social Innovation Park, Food for All, green societies from the various tertiary institutions, various businesses, and individuals already well known in the green sphere. As always, everyone is welcome!

Let us have a meaningful greater conversation about what we can do together! Do spread the word, and we hope to see you there!

Foodwise, Naive has kindly put together a special three-course menu at the price of $18+ for those wishing to dine there.

How to get there: By bus- 10, 12, 14, 32, 40; By car- parking is available at Katong Mall and Katong Village

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(We are selling Al Gore’s new book, Our Choice, at Green Drinks to raise fund for the Haiti Earthquake relief operations. Have 40 copies of the book to sell at $50 each. 100% of profits will go to the Singapore Red Cross who will channel it to the International Federation of Red Cross Red Crescent Societies.)

What Do You Do With Used Red Packets?

Chinese New Year is 1 month away and it’s the time for receiving and giving out red packets. What do you do with all the used red packets? If you have reused them to make something, take a photo, share your tips and send to editor@zerowastesg.com. We will post the interesting ones on our website. Thanks and look forward to some great ideas!

20,000 Wishing Spheres Recycled After Marina Bay Singapore Countdown

In Oct 2009, a friend informed Zero Waste Singapore about the disposal of wishing spheres for the Marina Bay Singapore Countdown. We have seen the spheres before but never asked what happened to them after the year-end countdown party.

The Wishing Sphere Project is a significant component of the Marina Bay SINGAPORE Countdown. Members of the community are all invited to join in the project by penning their wish for the New Year on a wishing sphere. Each wishing sphere represents a hope, a belief that the New Year will bring new possibilities and the promise of a brighter tomorrow.

We will mark your wish by floating the wishing spheres onto the waters of Marina Bay, our bay of hope and light. To meet the growing demand for wishing spheres as more people come onboard this meaningful annual tradition, we have doubled the number of wishing spheres to 20,000 spheres this year! – Marina Bay Singapore Countdown

We were told that after the countdown, the wishing spheres made of plastic PVC are disposed of and sent to the incineration plant. The wishing spheres have been disposed of every year – 5,500 in 2007, 10,000 in 2008 and 20,000 in 2009 (soon). This is a waste of resources and results in more carbon and dioxins emissions.

The suggestion given by our friend was to organise a petition to get the organisers to do something about this waste. However, we feel that a different approach was needed given the short time that we had. So we decided to meet up with the organisers, Esplanade, to discuss and work towards a win-win solution for Esplanade and the environment.

We had a fruitful discussion with the Esplanade staff, where we emphasised the importance of the 3Rs – Reduce, Reuse and Recycle (in order of sequence). Given the short timeframe, the immediate focus was to reuse and recycle the spheres for this year’s event. And to start now to explore how to reduce the waste and pollution for next year’s event.

We provided the following suggestions and contacts:

Reduce

1) Look for more environmentally friendly material

• Residues and Resource Reclamation Centre, NTU
• SIMTech, Sustainability and Technology Assessment
• Ngee Ann Polytechnic, Environment and Water Technology Centre of Innovation
• Companies providing biodegradable plastic products

2) Cap or reduce number of spheres

Reuse

3) Reuse for art by schools and organisations

• Didier Ng
• Hansart

4) Give to local or foreign orphanages, children homes, NGOs

5) Reuse to make new products such as bags

• Kare Social Enterprise, ITE College East
• Watsan Action, Indonesia

Recycle

6) Send it to a recycling company to process into raw material

We searched for recycling contractors that collect plastic PVC waste and contacted them. We finally found a recycling contractor who was interested in collecting the spheres, and gave the contacts to Esplanade.

In Nov 2009, Esplanade decided to send the 20,000 wishing spheres for recycling after the countdown. The recycling contractor will export the plastic spheres for recycling. Recycling the plastic spheres might not be the best solution but it’s still better than sending them to the incineration plant. Kudos to the Esplanade staff for taking the first step to reduce waste and do their part for the environment.

It’s actually not that difficult to reduce your waste, sometimes it only takes the right advice and contacts. If you’re organising an event where large amounts of waste are being generated, remember the 3Rs in waste management and reduce, reuse or recycle your waste. And of course, Zero Waste Singapore is available if you need help.

Have a great 2010 and let us work towards a Zero Waste Singapore!

Images credit: Marina Bay Countdown 2009/10 – chooyutshing via Flickr; Wishing Spheres – chooyutshing via Flickr

How Nokia and TES-AMM Recycles Old Mobile Phones

Green Business Times went for a site visit recently to check out how Nokia and its e-waste vendor, TES-AMM (Singapore) Pte Ltd, collects and recycles old mobile phones.

Nokia has the largest voluntary mobile phone recycling scheme worldwide, with takeback and collection facilities in over 5,000 Nokia Care Centres across 85 countries.

In Singapore, Nokia currently has collection points in all Nokia Care Centres at Wheelock Place, Century Square, Parkway Parade, Causeway Point and Suntec City. Take back facilities are also available in NUS, NTU, SMU, Nanyang Polytechnic, Temasek Polytechnic, St Margaret Secondary, St Hilda Primary and Secondary, and Saint Andrew JC.

In July 2008, Nokia launched the deployment of the Nokia Recycling Kiosks (NRK), which are automated recycling kiosks, in Malaysia and Singapore. Nokia is also running the ‘Recycle A Phone & Adopt A Tree’ program in Indonesia, Singapore and Malaysia. With every phone sent for recycling, customers will receive a tree in their name planted under the NEWTrees initiative. This is a collaboration between Nokia, WWF Indonesia and Equinox Publishing, and Nokia has committed funds towards the planting of 100,000 trees in Indonesia.

In Singapore, Nokia is working with TES-AMM to recycle raw materials from the mobile phones collected. The raw materials recovery rate at TES-AMM is as high as 99%. Many different materials and precious metals can be recycled from mobile phones and made into new products, including:

• Plastic: Plastic is largely used on the covers and external parts of a mobile device. They are turned into plastic pallets to be used in warehousing.
• Stainless Steel: This is used on external detailing phone covers and some internal components. It can be recycled and used again in all sorts of products from mobile devices, to kitchen kettles, ovens and in bicycle frames.
• Copper: Copper is used in a mobile phone’s circuitry and printed wiring boards. It can be recycled into copper pipes or to make musical instruments.
• Gold: Small amounts of gold are used in a mobile phone to coat connectors and electrical surfaces. It can be recycled and used again in other mobile and electronic devices, dental fillings or to make jewellery.
• Platinum: This is used in the electrical components of a mobile phones. It can be reclaimed and used in catalytic convertors for passenger cars, for equipment, dental filling or in jewellery.
• Cobalt and lithium salt: These rare earth metals are recovered from recycled batteries and are re-made into lithium ion batteries.

Here are some photos taken during the site visit at TES-AMM’s recycling facility:

Mobile phone recycling

Manual dismantling of old mobile phones

Sorting of components

Crushing of circuit boards and sieving

Ferrous metal separation

Crushed circuit boards

Crushed circuit boards undergo hammer mill and electrostatic separation to get:

Fibrous powder (for making plastic pallets)

Metal powder (contains 60-70% copper)

Fibrous powder and other waste plastics used to make plastic pallets by heat extrusion

Chemical processes to extract gold from components

Gold melting

Li-ion battery recycling

Some Banks Just Don’t Get It

It is amazing how some banks waste resources in their marketing campaigns. One example is when banks send pre-approved credit cards to their customers, even though their customers never ask for those cards.

The photo above shows all the material inside a single envelope by DBS, including the letter, pre-approved credit card, brochures, card agreement, and discount vouchers. Customers who are not interested in the credit cards offered by the banks simply throw them away, hopefully into recycling bags or bins.

Imagine the envelopes, letters, brochures and credit cards that go to waste, just because the banks simply chose to throw them at their customers without asking them if they want the credit cards in the first place. These banks are not only wasting resources and money but also ending up irritating their customers.

Are you one of those banks? It’s time to rethink and do things differently (hint: read Seth Godin’s books for help).

This post was first published at Green Business Times.

Photos of Recycling Day 2009

The photos that we took at today’s Recycling Day is posted on our Facebook page. Here’s a preview:

Recycling Day 2009

The annual Recycling Day is back this weekend and next, check out the NEA website for more details and activities.

Image source: Clean and Green Singapore

Can Recycle?

We have been receiving a few enquiries from our readers on whether their waste items can be recycled under the National Recycling Programme (NRP) or using the public recycling bins. They asked whether these items can be recycled – Yakult bottles, milk cartons, CDs, plastic packaging, shredded paper, spectacles, aluminium foil, styrofoam boxes, shoes, soft toys, pillows, clothing, food cans, stamps, magazines, etc.

To be frank, we don’t have all the answers. To us, all items can be recycled technically. But whether the items actually get collected for recycling depends on the National Environment Agency (NEA), the recycling collectors and the market for the recyclables. Some collection companies do not collect certain items as there are only small quantities, whereas other items are not collected because there is no market for them.

We think the best way to answer your enquiries is to start a new initiative called Can Recycle? If you’re not sure whether an item can be recycled, take a photo of the item (please try to keep each photo below 200 KB) and post the photo on our Facebook page. Write Can Recycle? in the title and a brief description of the item.

We will consolidate the enquiries each month and check with NEA on whether the items can be recycled. We will also create a Can Recycle? section on our website, which serves as a database where you an check what items can be recycled.

Next time when you’re wondering: Can Recycle? Remember to take a photo of the item and post it on Facebook. We will do our best to check and give you an answer.

$15 Million Seed Fund to Build Capabilities in Waste Management

This is a news release from NEA.

Singapore, 5 June 2009 – A $15 million Environment Technology Research Programme (ETRP) has been launched by the Minister for the Environment and Water Resources Dr Yaacob Ibrahim, as part of the Environment and Water Industry Development Council (EWI) and National Environment Agency (NEA)’s joint efforts to develop capabilities in waste management.

The ETRP is an initiative to build up technological competencies in waste management and to support a growing ecosystem of companies and researchers undertaking Clean Environment Research and Development (R&D). It will provide funding support for Singapore-based companies, research institutes (RIs) and Institute of Higher Learning (IHLs) to develop, pilot and commercialise advanced technologies for waste management. Through ETRP, the Ministry hopes to catalyse and incubate indigenous, sustainable and cost-efficient waste management solutions that are not only applicable locally but can also be exported to other cities facing similar waste challenges. Read more

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