Kids propose Disposing hazardous waste in harmless ways
Mentoring young minds is one of the most needed requirements in today’s India. Children in the present scenario have oceans of options to select the field they want to shine based on their skill-set. They need the conducive ambience and the correct guide to make their idea an invention the nation would need.
The amount of waste Coimbatore generates goes to several tonnes in a month and managing these wastes demands attention and strategy. The ideas from the industry alone would provide viable solutions and young school children could have valuable ideas which could be used as a start to something bigger than just a short term cure but a permanent solution.
PSG Science and Technology Enterpreneurial Park – PSG STEP understands that the young minds in Coimbatore should be given a platform where they could be receive proper condtioning from accomplished teachers and start-up founders, so that they could take their ideas to the next phase. In that perspective, PSG STEP joined hands with Industrial Waste Management Association (IWMA) to conduct Young Environmental Scientist program on 25.8.2019 in PSG Tech premises.
Dr.P.Radhakrishnan, Director, PSG IAS, K.Baskaran, Chairman and R.Jaganathan, Vice Chairman, IWMA took part in the event.
Around 100 teams, predominantly from Coimbatore and a few from Erode District participated in this program, where the students presented their innovative project that could provide solutions for disposing hazardous wastes in a harmless way to the environment.
During the program, Dr.S.P.Suriyaraj,Scientific Officer, PSG-STEP NRIIC in his address to the students conveyed the available technologies for waste management and how useful products could be made from wastes. He touched upon green measures that could be taken in Food Preservation processes. For instance, most of us think that the wax coating is given to fruits for looks but in reality it is given for preserving the product than for its visual appeal.
However the wax coating is not a hit among our Indian markets. Dr.S.P.Suriyaraj, in his speech mentioned that there are edible starch solutions which could takeover the wax coating concept and give the same benefiits in the preservation of fruits. He also elaborated on various products that are being made from recycled wastes; like Sprout Pencls from recycled paper that houses seeds, Starch based bio-degradeable carry bags that comes as an alternative to plastic, recovering minerals (heavy metals) from the effluents of electroplating industries , using gypsum based concrete blocks as an alterantive to red bricks.
Dr. S.P. Suriyaraj mentioned about how R.O. Technology remains the most used water treatment process in the industry. Though R.O. is widely used in the urban sides, the rural population are in need of an affordable and effective alternative. He conveyed how terafil water filter techs could come in handy for the rural folks and how new affordable techs should be invented for the benefit of the people. The need to recycle e-wastes were also conveyed to the students via videos to the students by him.
The students presented their projects in three sessions. The top 20 projects by the students were selected for mentoring and enhancement. The best projects will be honored on the Young Enviroment Scientists Awards Function that will be held during the 2nd week of October. Sprout Pencils were given to all the students.