AmBev Opens Huge Recycling Center
Saturday, November 3rd, 2007Synopsis in English: The Brazil-based beverage giant, Beverage Company of the Americas (AmBev), has just inaugurated a huge recycling center in Rio de Janeiro state. AmBev is the largest beverage producer in Brazil, one of the largest in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC), the largest bottler of Pepsi outside the US, and the fifth […]
Apoio de R$22.9 milhões para cooperativas de catadores
Monday, October 15th, 2007Synopsis in English: Brazilian President Lula announced on 01 October the first 24 financial lines to be awarded by the National Economic and Social Development Bank (BNDES) to cooperatives of unofficial waste sorters/ recyclers known in Brazil as catadores. The catador cooperatives are generally composed of the very poor that live off of the recyclables […]
Bahia to Adopt Paraná’s Zero Waste Program Model
Saturday, October 13th, 2007I’ve mentioned here several times the innovative Zero Waste Program (Programa Desperdício Zero) of the southern Brazilian state Paraná, such as how it applies to glass recycling, pesticide packaging, aseptic packaging and finding new ways to reuse/recycle plastic (PET) bottles (such as building solar water heaters). At some point I should do a comprehensive post […]
Software to Calculate Gains from Recycling / Software para calcular los beneficios de reciclar
Thursday, September 20th, 2007Municipalities have been known to spend thousands of dollars to consultants to provide them with an assessment of the economic and environmental viability of creating and implementing a municipal recycling program. Now several Brazilian professors have created a software package that they claim will do all that with just a few clicks of a computer […]
Brazilian Industry Attitudes About Environmental Regulation
Wednesday, September 19th, 2007In a recent post I discussed the results for the southern Brazilian state of Santa Catarina (SC) of a special survey about industry’s environmental concerns conducted by the National Confederation of Industries (CNI). I’ve gotten my hands on the national level results for the survey, and thought I would pass them along. The survey updated […]
Argentina and Brazil Propose HCFC Phaseout
Tuesday, March 20th, 2007Synopsis in English: Argentina and Brazil have submitted a joint proposal to the secretariat of the Montreal Protocol (on substances that deplete the ozone layer – ODS) calling for negotiations on phasing out use of hydrochlorofluorocarbons (HCFCs). HCFCs became the substitute of choice for many of the chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) controlled under the Protocol in such […]
It Does Indeed Add Up…
Monday, March 12th, 2007Sometimes you have step back from all the “big” and sensational stories out there and spotlight the modest successes that, if duplicated elsewhere and all such efforts were added together, would be a major story indeed. I just ran across this press release from a mid-sized city (pop. 102,000) in the southern Brazilian state of […]
Jalisco Gets a Waste Law
Monday, February 26th, 2007The Mexican state of Jalisco (JL) just published in its official gazette the text of its recently passed Law on the Integrated Management of Wastes. Jalisco joins the Federal District (DF) and the states of Colima, Guanajuato, Querétaro and Veracruz in adopting its own waste law to supplement the federal Law for the Prevention and […]
BNDES cria linha de apoio para catadores de materiais recicláveis
Tuesday, November 21st, 2006Synopsis in English: Brazil’s National Economic and Social Development Bank (BNDES) is offering a new financing line intended to help cooperatives of catadores (wastepickers) conduct urban recycling operations. The BNDES line will assist the cooperatives, generally composed of the very poor that live off of the recyclables they collect, sort and sell, to invest in […]
Recycling Coconuts II: Need Anything Be Wasted?
Tuesday, October 31st, 2006In Part I I looked at how some projects have sprung up in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) to convert those “empty” coconut husks discarded after agua de coco is served or bottled/packaged into useful products, such as flower pots, plant basket liners or “growing walls.” But the market potential for such products may […]
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