RADDI KI ATMAKATHA

At the end of every month the newspapers, magazines, used notebooks, invitation cards, flyers etc from our hpuseholds stack up and go to the raddiwala. But what happens after that???

It has been estimated that the recovery rate of paper in India is only 26 percent!! This means that almost 6.5 million tons of paper reaches landfills as refuse and is lost forever...

Before reaching the recycling mills the paper goes through various middlemen.

First in the cycle is the scrap dealer, also known as the kabariwallah, who collects waste from homes. He does a basic level segregation and sells his goods to the local dealer.

In terms of paper waste, newspapers are a majority. The new trend observed is that a number of households generally get at least two papers and the weight of the newspaper is also more because a number of add-on supplement papers, advertisement flyers attached  and content. The raddiwala buys the newspaper at approximately Rs 9 per kg from the households and sells it to the local dealer (at Rs 10.50)

After collecting all the waste, the scrap dealer sells his goods to the local area dealer. Here another level of basic segregation takes place. In case of newspaper waste, each paper has to be straightened, sorted and bundled into organised stacks before it can be sold further. These dealers work with different wholesalers—there are separate wholesalers for different kinds of waste.

These are the steps to recycling in the paper mill:

1.      Storage and Collection

Recovered paper is unloaded into a warehouse and segregated as per grades.

2.      Re-pulping and Screening

The recovered paper moves on a conveyer through a pulper which chops, heats and breaks down the paper with water and chemicals to form fibers of cellulose.

Next the pulp is forced to pass through screen with holes of different sizes, which eliminate plastic, glue and any other particles.

3.      Cleaning

By spinning the pulp in large funnel shaped cylinders, heavy (like staples) and light contaminants are removed.

4.      De inking

This is a “pulp laundering” operation to remove printing ink and “stickies”. Two processes are used in combination- washing and flotation.

5.      Refining, Bleaching and Colour Striping

The fibers are made to swell and large bundles undergo refining to separate then into finer fibers. If the pulp is coloured then clour striping removes the dyes present.

If  the recycled paper is to be made white, it is bleached with hydrogen peroxide, chlorine dioxide or ozone.

6.      Papermaking (finally...!!!)

The pulp is mixed with water and chemicals and this mixture is sprayed onto a huge flat wire screen moving through a paper machine. Water starts to drain out due to press-rollers and the fibers bond.

The sheets, now resembling paper go through heated metal roller, thereby drying them. Glossy coating, if needed, is applied at this stage.

Finally, the finished paper is wound into a giabt roll and removed from the paper machine!

If you know WHY, now know HOW!

Saving paper in educational institutions and workplaces

• Use both sides of notebook paper. Avoid leaving white space as   much as you can.
• Don't do silly things with paper like making planes, throwing it in your classmates' heads and so on. Not only is it wasting paper, such behaviour can get you in trouble with school staff.
• Write small, (but legible) so the paper will last longer.
• Educate your classmates and other students on ways to conserve and reuse paper: posters, "Tip of the Day" in the daily bulletin, whatever works.
• Recycle clean but used paper into scratch paper for teachers.
• Get businesses to donate paper. Workplaces often have reams of  paper goods that are not used, such as outdated letterhead paper, envelopes of the wrong size, and outdated signs. Ask local businesses, the workplaces of parents, and the like, to donate these paper goods to your school to be reused.
• Don't write on random pieces of paper to remember things. (They  are too easily lost anyway). Use the  text-message or note application on your cell phone.
• Don't use the stapled notebooks like the ones at school. After you've filled out more than half of the notebook, you can't rip out an empty sheet without ripping out a written one too. Consider using  a spiral notebook.
• Use both sides of every piece of paper.  Find out how to make double sided copies when you photocopy.  If you have a piece of paper that is printed on one side only, use the back as rough paper  before you finally put it in the recycling box.
• Always tick the box to say that you do not want to be sent marketing material whenever you apply for anything by post or online.
• To stop unwanted free newspapers and leaflets you could phone the companies concerned but a small polite sign on your door asking that no circulars or free newspapers are delivered will probably be more effective.
• Old magazines will always be accepted gratefully by many organizations (and by your friends!). Donate them to hospitals, GP surgeries, dentists, libraries or anywhere with a waiting room.
• Buy books second hand or borrow books and magazines from your library/friends.
  
  Offices
  
• Use unbleached and uncoloured paper.
• Buy products in bulk to minimize packaging .
• Print on Both Sides
• Use a stick on label on the first page of a fax instead of a cover sheet.
• Get rid of paper files and folders- put it all online 
• Use the back side of old paper for scratch pads 
• Recycle all paper instead of shredding it or disposing it.
• Ask to be removed from mailing lists, or suggest the system of electronic mailing list.
  
  In general
  
• Pay your bills online!!!
• Bookmark pages online, and work off the screen, instead of printing them out
  (But if you really need to print something out, most printer software allows you to print multiple “pages” to a single piece of paper – the computer will shrink the page down, and print 2, 4 or more on a single sheet of paper – this alone can halve or quarter your printer paper use.)
• A lot of magazines now run companion websites with similar content – just updated more frequently. You still might pay a subscription fee, but rather than a magazine being printed (and eventually thrown out), you get a password to access their website.
  
  - Erma Frank

POST 'EM n SPREAD THE WORD!

                               THINK BEFORE YOU PRINT!

Watch This!!

Aditi Khandelwal

A Frank Request

“I really WANT to do something about the environment....I mean, I switch off the lights and fans and all...but...” “I want to do something, but I don’t know what!”
Surprisingly, these are refrains you hear from the youth today. The ‘college-going’ crowd, who seem too busy with their friends, their parties, and ‘having a life’ in general. The ones with the ‘insensitive’ or ‘de-sensitised’ tag.  At some level, we all want to save ourselves by saving the environment, what with being dogged by the palpable effects of global warming.
All the same, I’m not set out to make a speech on global warming and its effects. Neither to reel out a list of advice on eco friendly solutions.

I would, although, put forth a consideration.
If someone had to start an initiative at the institution level, well-meaning of course, you’d be sure to follow. Given that it’s not cumbersome or doesn’t demand much of your time, or any-ideally.

We all gather our unused or half-used sheets of paper; categorise it, if necessary. A team of people (self elected?) takes the responsibility of getting it bound. These sheets are used again in the form of books, sold for a small price. At a school or college, how much more ideal can this get? And if you hear it’s already being practised, and well, you have reference for your institution!
Such is the practise at Apostolic Carmel High School, Mumbai. A school-level initiative called the “Carmel Green Giants” headed by the school librarian Ms.Christine, as mentioned above.

The approach is cyclical-as there’ll always be students who’ll need books-who’ll be generating re-usable paper-and those who can head the initiative. It’s just the first step that’s the longest stride.

~ERMA FRANK

Do Your Bit !

You look at your watch for the fortieth time. You feel like its been forty minutes since you last breathed. You've been trying to focus on understanding and taking down notes, but instead, your mind wanders and you begin to think about your professor's striking resemblance to Yoko Ono and begin to map out ways in which the genes could have possibly travelled down. While you're thinking about this, you can't help but put a smile on your face with lyrics of your favourite John Lennon song. Yes, You are bored. While you engage yourself in this extremely entertaining and enlightening activity, much to your relief, the bell rings.. And its time to breathe once again! Your joy knows no bounds!

Six pages. That’s how much you blindly wrote random words from the lecture, doodled, and communicated with your friends... Save the precarious type of students, you’ve used a rough equivalent of half the sheet. No point in cramming, you figure, so turn the page! The next page sees a similar story....And so will many other pages. As much as we hate to let noble thoughts like 'Saving the World' and 'Reducing waste' take our mind off our fun for even the slightest bit, it’s important for us to realise that our actions don't really need conscious steering in this direction.

As media students, we are trying to reach out to youngsters who believe that Protecting the Environment is far too large for teenie tiny entities like us, people like us. All we need to develop is an understanding that steps towards this larger goal are not taken once and for all, but must be taken as and when possible. We generate a lot of waste at the individual level and a major amount of it can be reduced. Simple steps like using both sides of a page, making use of the margins of our page to take down quick notes/talk to your friend sitting beside you during a lecture, and restricting your doodling to a limited space will help us reduce a large amount of paper waste. A very interesting way to do your bit for this cause without taking much effort is the iFold Save Paper initiative by Ogilvy and Mather. One of the methods suggested by this initiative is folding your letters and bills to the smallest size you can, which will, in turn, reduce the size of the envelopes you use to post them. Hence, we shall be able to save a considerable amount of paper.
As part of our campaign, we'd like you all to send us your half-used notebooks or any other paper that can be used to write on. We will use these unused pages and bind them into notebooks which will be provided to poor children who cannot afford to buy notebooks.
It is essential for us to have your complete support in order for our baby steps to help us make a difference. With this, we plan not only to reduce paper, but also to help students in need.
So the next time you find yourself wanting to scribble something down, take a moment off to think about the difference you'd be making if you were just a little more sensitive.

~AASHNA GOPALKRISHNAN