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Loading ...São Paulo Offers Packaging Bill for Public Comment
Friday, May 22nd, 2009The Environment Secretariat (SMA) of São Paulo (SP) today published for public comment on its website a draft bill for a law on post-consumer packaging. The bill would create a rather complex shared responsibility system to ensure that post-consumer packaging in SP is either recycled or reused. Anyone wishing to submit comments or suggested changes to the […]
Salvadorian Industry Initiative Recovers 2178 Tons of Plastic Waste in 2008
Friday, April 3rd, 2009El Salvador’s Environment Ministry (MARN) and Health Ministry (MSPAS) just recognized the efforts of a local industry initiative known as Reciplast, which in 2008 recovered 2,178.3 metric tons (mT) of plastic waste. What is Reciplast? It owes its existence in part to MARN and MSPAS. In 2001 MARN and MSPAS launched a National Program for […]
Mexico’s Superama Chain to Recycle Plastic Bags
Wednesday, February 4th, 2009Mexico’s Superama supermarket chain, a subsidiary of Wal-Mart de Mexico, has launched a campaign to collect and recycle plastic shopping bags. The chain hopes to recycle at least one million bags annually, and notes that if they only meet (but not excede, as they hope to do) this goal, they will save 59.6 metric tons […]
Santiago Sets 25% Recycling Target
Tuesday, January 20th, 2009A working group co-chaired by the National Environment Commission’s directorate for the Metropolitan Region (CONAMA-RM), the mayor’s office and the nongovernmental organization Casa de La Paz (“Peace House”) — aided by the steel firm Gerdau AZA and the German technical cooperation agency GTZ — has hammered out an action plan to have the RM — […]
Minas Trumpets Its Waste Policy Achievements
Saturday, December 27th, 2008Minas Gerais, Brazil’s second most populous state and one of its mining, metals and agriculture powerhouses, is pretty proud of its recent accomplishments in waste policy and management. I’ve chronicled here a couple of their steps, such as the modernized inspection/enforcement regime and the creation of the Waste Reference Center (CMRR). But that only touches […]
Recycling Used Motor Oil Packaging in Brazil
Thursday, December 25th, 2008In past posts I’ve discussed how recovery of used motor oil is still in its early stages in Latin American nations such as Brazil and Colombia. But that’s only part of the waste problem generated by the lubricants we use in motor vehicles. There’s also the packaging that the new motor oil comes in, the […]
Recovering Used Oil in Colombia
Tuesday, December 23rd, 2008Recently Colombia’s Environment Minister, Juan Lozano Ramírez, lauded an industry initiative in that country to collect and environmentally manage used motor oil and lubricants known as the Used Oil Fund (Fondo de Aceites Usados – FAU). “This process is progressing successfully, ” declared Lozano, “because the trend now is, without a doubt, business strengthening that […]
Pará Adopts a Recycling Policy
Wednesday, October 22nd, 2008Earlier this month Governor Simão Jatene signed a law creating a State Materials Recycling Policy for Pará. The new Law is based on similar measures adopted recently by its neighbor Amapá and by several other Brazilian states, including Minas Gerais, Mato Grosso, Mato Grosso do Sul and Rondônia (see the Temas list of waste/recycling legislation […]
Mexico City Formally Implements Its Waste Law…Finally!
Friday, October 10th, 2008This week Mexico’s Federal District (DF) — the zone encompassing Mexico City and its environs — published the implementing regulation for its 2003 Waste Law — five years later than called for by the Law. Although the lack of an implementing does not stop a law from being applied and programs being launched (and the […]
Rio Bans Pigmented PET Packaging
Thursday, August 28th, 2008Last month something a bit astonishing happened quietly in the Brazilian state of Rio de Janeiro. The state Governor, Sérgio Cabral, signed into law a very short bill. The new Law outlaws the manufacture or sale in the state of pigmented PET packaging. The rationale? Such packaging is not accepted for recycling by either waste-pickers […]