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Gerber saves juice with new
pallet repair facility
Gerber Juice Company and pallet supplier CHEP UK are
saving 763 tonnes of CO2, 200,000 litres of diesel fuel and
330,000 road miles through the establishment of a new
pallet repair centre on the juice supplier’s manufacturing site
in Somerset.
Now, instead of sending pallets to Avonmouth (Bristol) for
repair and re-distribution, CHEP customers in Cornwall, Devon
and Somerset only have to send them as far as Bridgwater in
Somerset, saving hundreds of thousands of road miles each year
and removing the need for 40 journeys to and from Europe.
The joint initiative has also created 10 new jobs.
Fujitsu turns CDs
into PCs
Fujitsu has developed the first
system for recycling CDs and DVDs
into notebook PCs. The company is
collecting used CDs and DVDs at Fujitsu
Group recycling centres and using
the plastic recovered in the bodies of
notebook PCs, including the front panel
of the LIFEBOOK P772/E. Fujitsu claims
this will allow it to reduce the amount
of newly produced plastic needed by 10
tons per year and cut CO2 emissions
by approximately 15%. Fujitsu says that
recycled CDs and DVDs are suitable
for use in computers because they are
made from polycarbonate, a type of
plastic that can be used in the bodies
of notebook PCs, and do not contain
contaminants, such as flame
retardants.
www.fujitsu.
com
Redeem extends
contract with O2
Mobile phone recycling company
Redeem has extended its contract
with O2 (Telefonica UK) to include
business as well as consumer
recycling services, after a
competitive pitch which saw the
company bringing ground-breaking
recycling technology to the
partnership.
The Falkirk company has developed
a mobile site that uses automatic
mobile phone detection to determine
the brand and model of mobile being
used so that it can offer a recycling
price instantly.
To date, Redeem has processed
over 500,000 mobiles for O2 Recycle
and paid O2 customers more than
£35 million for their old devices.
All profits generated by O2 from
the recycling programme are donated
to O2’s Think Big programme, which
offers young people aged between 13
and 25 the chance to receive funding,
training and support to develop ideas
or initiatives of benefit to their local
community.
www.o2recycle4business.co.uk
IGEL breathes life
into old PCs
Leading thin client manufacturer
IGEL is promoting the ability of its
IGEL Universal Desktop Converter
(UDC) software to extend the life of
old PCs by migrating them to fully
manageable IGEL Universal Desktop
thin client-like devices. The software
also makes the hardware more
efficient to run.
IGEL UK managing director Simon
Richards said: “This approach allows
businesses to cost effectively extend
the life of their current desktops to
deliver a Server-Based Computing
architecture or to produce a shorter
return on investment when migrating
to a Virtual Desktop Infrastructure
(VDI) environment. IGEL’s UDC
software allows IT environments
with mixed desktop hardware, such
as PCs or thin clients from different
manufacturers, to be standardised
at low cost and to be efficiently and
securely managed over a network, or
over the Internet, by means of one
interface.”
IGEL adds that cost savings of up
to 70% brought
about by desktop
standardisation
and standardised
remote
management will
enable customers to
cushion investment
and licensing
costs incurred in
centralisation or
VDI projects in
the data centre.
www.igel.co.uk
Timber pallets have lower carbon
footprint
An EUR/EPAL exchangeable pallet has a five times smaller
environmental impact than a plastic pallet, according to
Polytechnic of Milan research commissioned by the Italian
National Committee, ConLegno, with the support of EPAL. EPAL
is the largest pallet pool in the world with 500 million pallets in
use and 70 million added annually.
The study into the environmental lifecycles of EUR/EPAL pallets,
pooled plastic equivalents and one-trip wooden pallets concluded
that when the combined impact of carbon emissions and the
use of soil and fossil fuels was taken into account an EUR/EPAL
exchangeable pallet had a significantly smaller carbon footprint.
It found the timber used in a single pallet would have absorbed
18.4kg of carbon from the atmosphere, which it will store until the
end of its useful life.
The research was carried out by the Department of Chemistry,
Chemical and Material Engineering (NATTA) and coordinated by
Professor John Dotelli, according to ISO 14040 and ISO 14044
standards.
Alan Keates, Brepal Chairman, said: “This study provides yet more
evidence that timber is clearly the material of choice for pallets and
packaging, by virtue of its overall lower impact on the environment
compared to other materials. The wood used in the 66,816,972
pallets manufactured as a part of the EPAL business in 2010 alone
would account for approximately 1.23 million tonnes of carbon
removed from the atmosphere and stored. Not only are timber
pallets more environmentally friendly, they also remain the most
reliable and least expensive option on the market.”
www.brepal.org.uk
greenAgenda