I opened FB this morning and had a great personal message that I want to share with everyone. Its a great question and it comes from India. Hi Harvey First of all with due respect, I salute you for the kind of work you are doing. My friend Vishal told me about Ubuntu-Blox. I am presently doing a project on chemical recycling of post consumer PET waste and I am seriously stunned reading that you guys just compress the plastic and bind them, not involving any chemical process. I wanted to know is this the best method of using plastic waste ? Thank you for the great question. Im sure many have had the same question but were too timid to ask. Thank you. It is true that Ubuntublox can be made with all plastics. Some plastics are more difficult than others. The hard plastics need to be broken into small pieces for instance. Our recommendation is the Ubuntublox be made with foam and film plastics. There are two reasons we prefer these plastics for Ubuntublox. 1. Plastic resins are made from petroleum. Every pound of plastic waste that is recycled into new plastic takes the pressure off of the production of petroleum. The value of plastic waste fluctuates with the price of crude petroleum. At $100.00 raw plastic waste is usually worth $400.00 or so per ton. That plastic waste washed and ground into chips is worth $1,200.00 per ton. An Ubuntublox made with plastic bottles, about 90 each, will weigh approximately 7 lbs. On the street in most communities of the world where there is a recycling program that puts the scrap plastic value of that block at $.40. In a $2.00 per day economy the block is worth much more for scrap value than it is for a building block. In your field of study it is better to use the plastic scrap to recycle back into petroleum products or new plastics. You are lessening the need for new petroleum while removing the plastic from the environment. 2. Foam, Styrofoams, and film plastics weigh almost nothing. For instance an Ubuntublox made with Styrofoam filler in single use plastic bags will weigh slightly over a pound. That puts the scrap value of the plastic, if there is a scrap value, at lest than $.10. There is one more reality. There are few if any real efficient recycling programs for styrofoams and film plastics. Those plastics are true trash because of their lack of value. That is why they are the ones we see most often in the streets and in the oceans doing the most damage. Using the foam and film plastics to make Ubuntublox defines the mission of Ubuntublox. We are taking trash and giving it value as a building product. It no longer is trash because it has value. I see Ubuntublox divided into three categories. A lot of people see the Ubuntublox product, the building block, as the most important because it utilizes a nuisance by making it into a building product. Ubuntublox is known for converting plastic trash into building blocks. But other products can be used to make the Ubuntublox. We know that the waste product left over from Vetiver Oil production makes a great Ubuntublox. The most common use for the waste product before Ubuntublox is for fuel for the distilleries or just burning and polluting the air. We are looking at using some of the nuisance grasses that are everywhere to also make Ubuntublox. Once again it is all about taking something perceived as trash and a problem and using it to give it value. For me the second aspect of Ubuntulbox is just as important as the other two. Its the construction method to build homes and structures. We are looking at great homes, safe homes, and homes that can be built by the unskilled from materials readily available. It is about taking old technology and cultural wisdom and combining it with newer technologies and wisdom to create viable communities that have more value because the houses are designed to be good permanent safe homes for the least amount of expense. The third thing Ubuntublox brings to the community is employment. The collection and processing of the materials is work, employment. The production of the Ubuntublox is more jobs, employment. Then there are the jobs that are created building the structures like sheds and homes. We have did everything we know to do to make these jobs gender neutral. That means a single parent female can participate in her community, sometimes even in her home, creating income to support herself and her family. It also means that in some communities the women will be able to have jobs building homes too.
Posted on: Tue, 11 Mar 2014 13:39:43 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015