Earlier this year, the federal government announced that it is giving recycling company ResourceCo a loan of $30 million to build two waste-to-fuel plants producing “solid waste fuel”. Waste-to-energy is an important part of the waste industry in Europe. Significant demand for heat means efficient and tightly controlled waste incinerators are common. However, Australia lacks an established market, with low levels of community acceptance and no clear government policy encouraging its uptake. Do you like good gadgets? Those sweet cool gadgets? Oh, yeah But the federal announcement, coupled with an uptake in state funding, a New South Wales parliamentary inquiry and several new projects in the pipeline, signals a growing interest in waste-to-energy and waste-to-fuels. But what is solid waste fuel, and where does it fit in a sustainable future for Australian waste management? What are solid waste fuels? Australians are becoming more wasteful. The amount of rubbish it … [Read more...] about How we can save the world by fueling it with our waste
Waste problems in australia
Elon Musk’s fame used to be a huge advantage for Tesla — but now it’s becoming a problem
caption Looking cool! source Joe Scarnici / Getty Images for Best Events Tesla CEO Elon Musk is a rare thing in the car business: a celebrity and a leader. His celebrity has definitely helped fuel Tesla’s rise. But of late it has begun to reveal some disadvantages. Maybe you haven’t been paying attention to all things Tesla for the past two weeks. Here’s an update: Tesla reported first-quarter earnings and lost over $700 million in three months. CEO Elon Musk, who is supposed to be sleeping on the floor of his factory in California, flipped out on an earnings call, silencing two analysts and taking 20 minutes of questions from a YouTuber who owns less than 100 shares of Tesla stock and pitched his insights to Musk via Twitter. The stock tanked. Musk got on Twitter to attack the offending analysts as instruments of short-sellers; neither has a drastically bearish view of the … [Read more...] about Elon Musk’s fame used to be a huge advantage for Tesla — but now it’s becoming a problem
Construction in the cloud: The future of John Holland
John Holland is a construction, tunnelling, rail, building, and services provider, with operations in Australia, New Zealand, South East Asia, and the Middle East. At almost 70 years-old, the company plays in a space not synonymous with innovation, one CIO Chris Walsh said is always at the bottom of reports from the likes of McKinsey in terms of the industry's willingness to innovate or disrupt itself.Walsh wanted John Holland to prove such statistics wrong, and convinced the organisation that 100 percent cloud was key to getting ahead.After appointing a new CTO in Lia Taylor, who was previously with the local arm of Microsoft, John Holland turned to Amazon Web Services (AWS) in June last year. In January, the company started sending its legacy systems into the cloud, and as of this month, John Holland is 75 percent through its total AWS migration. Taylor expects completion to be on schedule for June."All legacy, entire datacentres, the works," Walsh added."We've got some really old … [Read more...] about Construction in the cloud: The future of John Holland
High-tech remote farming takes root in Canadian agriculture
By Chris Turner Special to the Star Tues., Sept. 12, 2017 If you haven’t visited a farm on the Canadian Prairies lately, the scale of 21st-century agriculture can seem staggering. Take Trevor Scherman’s spread: 4,400 acres (1,780 hectares) south of Battleford in central Saskatchewan. That’s more than four times the area of Vancouver’s Stanley Park, so if he needs to stop his tractor and wait for a hired hand to bring him more seed, it can take a while. Managing a farm of such size is all about efficiency. On Scherman’s smartphone is a single app created by a company called Farmers Edge, which gives him access to a range of data and management tools unimaginable even 10 years ago. Farmers Edge gathers data from three weather stations right on Scherman’s property and five others on neighbouring farms, and crunches the numbers to let him know if there’s wind headed his way that might disrupt pesticide spraying. The app contains … [Read more...] about High-tech remote farming takes root in Canadian agriculture
UNSW launches ‘world-first’ e-waste microfactory
The University of New South Wales (UNSW) has launched what it calls the world's first e-waste microfactory in an effort to reduce Australia's electronic waste. Following research at the university's Centre for Sustainable Materials Research and Technology (SMaRT Centre), the microfactory has been launched as the first in a series under development at UNSW that can turn consumer waste such as discarded smartphones and laptops into reusable materials. According to UNSW, the microfactory has the potential to reduce Australia's vast amounts of e-waste causing environmental harm and offers an alternative to practices such as burning or burying e-waste. "Our e-waste microfactory and another under development for other consumer waste types offer a cost-effective solution to one of the greatest environmental challenges of our age, while delivering new job opportunities to our cities but importantly to our rural and regional areas, too," said UNSW professor Veena Sahajwalla. "These … [Read more...] about UNSW launches ‘world-first’ e-waste microfactory