The Tribune

By DANA SMITH

BAHAMAS Waste is calling for members of the public to provide the company with old cardboard to be sent for recycling and used vegetable oil to be processed into fuel, in an effort to cut back on the amount of waste in the country’s ever growing landfill.

Francisco de Cardenas, Managing Director of Bahamas Waste Limited, told the Tribune on Earth Day that the used oil can be transformed into fuel for the company’s fleet of trucks, while recycling coordinator Brenville Ferguson said recycling one tonne of cardboard saves landfill space and trees - as well as the energy and resources used to process those trees into cardboard.

In an effort to encourage Bahamians to recycle, Mr de Cardenas said Bahamas Waste was willing to travel to pick up stocks of used cardboard and oil.

“They could drop some here,” he said.

“Or we will come and pick it up. If you have high volumes of cardboard, we’ll pick it up at your store at no charge.”

Mr Ferguson said: “With the cardboard recycling, you’re going to save about 17 trees from being cut down. It also saves about 6 cubic yards of landfill space.

“In the process of cutting trees down, they have to be processed in order to get cardboard, so you’re going to be using oil, you’re also going to be using water. By recycling the cardboard boxes, you’re eliminating the process it would take to produce cardboard.”

Bahamas Waste is also “collecting as much waste vegetable oil as we can” and converting it into bio-diesel.

Waste vegetable oil, Mr de Cardenas said, is basically just vegetable cooking oil that can no longer be used.

“Right now we are producing about four to five thousand gallons of bio-diesel per month and we we’re using it in over 70 per cent of our trucks at a blend of B50,” Mr de Cardenas said.

“From what I’m being told, we are only the second company in the world that is using bio-diesel in a commercial fleet at such high blends.”

He said: “People have historically been dumping it in their back yard or dumping it in the fill. We take it, we filter it - clean it up, we then process it with a chemical reaction, we filter it again and it comes out as a bio-diesel.

“We’ve been running some trucks on it for a year and a half. We have a couple of smaller company vehicles that we’re using B50, as well. We’re also using it in most of our forklifts - our yard equipment.”

He added that Bahamas Waste was willing to provide a drum for vegetable oil waste collection and pick it up on a monthly basis, free of charge.

Companies that have already signed on to provide vegetable oil waste include Wendy’s, KFC, McDonald’s, and Atlantis, Mr de Cardenas said.

“Persons should be more conscious about recycling,” Mr de Cardenas added.

“If you continue to discard of garbage the traditional way, you pollute the air and it will actually pollute your body.

“Also, the space we have at the landfill is pretty much near to completed. When that’s done, where do we go next?”