Ateneo de Manila Universtiy and its Green Revolution

May 6, 2009 By Leave a Comment

Ateneo de Manila University: An Advocate of the Environment

The Ateneo de Manila University has always been an advocate for environmental protection as can be seen from the wide-open spaces and limited number of air-conditioned rooms on-campus. They have also been implementing a waste segregation system, so both student and faculty will be trained to throw recyclables in one trash bin and non-recyclables in another.

Also, the Clean as You Go (CLAYGO) system was implemented in school cafeterias to ensure Ateneans had the discipline and courtesy to clean their tables, so that they can be readily used by others. Last school year 2008-2009, a new rule was implemented on-campus, in favor of ADMU’s support for the environment.

The Continued Green Revolution

In conjunction with the CLAYGO system a new system called Bring Your Own Baunan (BYOB) was implemented by the school administration with the help of the Student Council and the Environmental Science Society.

The premise of the BYOB is as follows:
• Cafeteria concessionaires will no longer be allowed to use any Styrofoam products in packaging their food. Instead, only paper products will be allowed.

• Concessionaires will also be provided with plastic plates, and metal spoon and forks, which students who dine-in the cafeteria or in nearby eating areas will use. Thus, the amount of trash will be lessened significantly

• Furthermore, students, faculty, and staff now have the option of bringing their own food containers such as reusable Tupperware. When they provide their own containers, they will receive a discount from any food concessionaire they buy from.

• Thus, not only will the amount of trash be reduced, but Ateneans will learn the value of reusing food containers as well.

On the other hand, students and teachers seem to disagree as to whether Styrofoam or paper is a bigger environmental hazard, and others also complain of the inconvenience that the BYOB system brings.

After all, you cannot take-out food unless you bring your own container. Also, the supposed discount is nullified by some concessionaires who just raised their prices in response to the project.

Nevertheless, the project was a success overall, and is a sign of the efforts the Ateneo de Manila University is making in its green revolution.

Filed Under: environmental hazards, Everyday Green, green revolution, Green Tips, Non-biodegradable Waste, Recycling, waste segregation Tagged With: , , , , ,

Money on Paper Recycling

April 22, 2009 By Leave a Comment

Earning money is easy with Recycled Paper.

Who said there is no money in recycling paper? They must be mistaking. Nowadays that the awareness of people about recycling paper has been intensified and companies even supports this campaign, many has made good money from selling recycled papers.

I can consider paper recycling as one of the oldest ways of making money from trash. It is easy especially when you have piles of used papers from school or office. Many shops are buying papers as long as it is not crumpled and wet. All you have to do is collect, save and sell, then that’s it! Easy money as they say.
I myself started to recycle paper couple of years ago. At first, it was not actually intended for selling or to make money out of it – really for the sake of recycling. What I did was I saved my school papers and reused the other side that is not printed or written on. But since it was piling-up, including the books, my mom thought of selling it. I was able to somewhat gain a small amount from it.

Recycling Papers will bring great benefits for you and for Mother Earth. If you think of making this as a business, you could start small. All it takes is hard-work, organization, and your time and you’ll find it easy to manage you Paper Recycling Business.

recycled-newspaper

recycled-paperbags

recycled-hamper

Filed Under: Green Tips, Recycling Tagged With: , , , ,

Recyced HP Ink Cartridges

February 16, 2009 By Leave a Comment

Let us give numbers to computer-related wastes we dump to our planet. How many computers do you think is manufactured everyday? How many printers? How many computers do a person buy over their lifetime? How many printers? How long is the lifespan of a computer before we dump them in junkyards? How many HP ink cartridges are recycles today?

recycling hp ink cartridges
Since I was in high school, I used 4 computers already. The first one I shared with my siblings. The second one was bought by my parents for my college dorm. The third one I bought using my first few months of salary. The last one that I have is a laptop.

I didn’t know what happened to the first computer. It was just wasn’t there anymore. The second computer is still in our house accumulating dust in the storage area. I gave my 3rd computer to my cousin who’s in college when I bought my laptop.

Now, the story of HP ink cartridges are a bit more complicated. I have been using my HP Deskjet printer since I was in college. It’s reliable although now there’s always the paper jam every other page I printed. Since I started using the printer, when the ink has run out, I discard the ink like I discard a banana peeling and then buy a new one.

It just made me realize how much the earth is burdened with HP in cartridges. Imagine how many people use HP printers and imagine how many of them run out of ink everyday. Those ink cartridges will go to our junkyards and will still be HP ink cartridges for another thousand and more years.

This is why I just realized why it’s a good idea go buy recycled ink cartridges. I was hesitant to buy because they say that the printer gets easily broken down. But a lot of people are already using them and so far their printers are still running smoothly.

So as not to burden the earth more, I will start using recycled HP ink cartridges. I hope there’s a more permanent solution to that but in the mean time, I think it will help a bit.

Filed Under: Everyday Green, Recycling, Toxic Wastes, Water Conservation Tagged With:

Philippine Malls Go Green

February 9, 2009 By Leave a Comment

philippine malls go green

    Filipinos are starting to go green, thanks to the effort of the biggest mall chains in the Philippines– SM Malls and Ayala Malls. They created environmental programs that aim to raise awareness about the environment and raise some money from recycling.
    SM Malls were the first to come up with the idea. The idea is to use the parking lot as place where people can bring all of the clutter and unused things in their house and sell that to private recyclers that are participating in the program. Almost all SM stores in the whole country participate in the Trash to Cash Recycling Market which is help once every few weeks or so.
    The Ayala Malls came up with the Recyclables Fair. They followed the same idea as SM Malls. They are attracting more and more people every time they hold the fair.
    The success of these programs tell us that Filipinos are already on the path to going green. It is also a way to rid their house of the clutter and unused items. They will also earn some money while tidying their things at home.
    This is also beneficial to the malls. Once the people traded their recyclables for cash, there is nowhere else to go than straight to the department store. The malls may not directly earn from the program but ultimately the money that the people will earn from selling their recyclables will end up in the mall’s cashiers.
    The best thing about it is that it is benefiting everyone including the earth. Filipinos are realizing that they can help in saving the environment– that the environmental problems that we are facing are not the problems of the government alone. I hope that more and more people will participate in the programs.
Filed Under: Everyday Green, Recycling Tagged With: ,

Recycling Glass

February 4, 2009 By 1 Comment

recyling glass

    Recycling glass is another way that we can go green in our homes. Over month, we may fill up a box of waste bottles that we used– jars, wine bottles, glass soda bottles and other containers that are made of glass. We can help reduce the amount of waste glass that is coming to our landfills by separating them and putting them in glass banks.
    We just have to separate the glass by color. The most common colors of glass are colorless, green and brown. The colorless glass are the our jars and soda bottles. Green glass bottles are the wine bottles. Brown glass bottles are the beer bottles.
    They can be broken down and turn into recycled glass. Glass can be recycled over and over again and less energy is needed to recycle glass than to make glass. It will also conserve our natural resources.
    Recycling glass can also mean using our waste glass for other purposes. We can re-use jars to store sugar or coffee. We can also re-use wine bottles as decors for our living rooms.
    Big companies who manufacture beer and wines are also being urged to re-fill used bottles. This is what many companies in the Philippines do. People collect waste bottles in the community, they clean the bottles and they sell it to the companies who own the bottles so that the company can use the bottles again.
    But majority of companies who use bottles for containers of their products still manufacture or buy new glass. We can reduce our national usage of our fuel if we encourage these companies to follow the other companies who refill their bottles.
Filed Under: Everyday Green, Green Homes, Green Tips, Recycling Tagged With: ,
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