Name: Mehr Un Nisa Javed
Date: 6th November’2019
Professor: Marcela Godoy
Objective:
Find local craft techniques, and find local materials that Chinese people have been using. Is there any technique we can replicate using plastic? Do you think we can replicate those materials using plastic?
Research about plastic solutions and post it on your journal.Choose one between “Design Is The Problem” and “Bio-Thinking” as an evaluation framework or tool for assessing the sustainability of your these solutions.
Chinese Craft:
Whenever I think about Chinese craft Chinese Fan, is the first thing that comes to my mind as I have always watched this in movies to represent Chinese Culture. “The history of Chinese fan can be dated to over 3,000 years ago, around the Shang Dynasty (C.16th-11th BC). … Later this Shanhan became a long-handled fan made of thin and tough silk or birds’ feathers, called a zhangshan fan, which was mainly used by the emperor’s honour guard as decoration.”
I think we can make Chinese fan using plastic because I think it would be really nice to have plastic inlace of the materials already being used. The material used to make the fan is really of thin nature therefore, we would need to use a thin natured plastic fully compressed in order to make a fan. We would also either need to use mold or we can laser cut later to give it the fan shape.
Response:
Research on the Famous Companies working in China for Recycling Plastic
1)Shanghai Yadu Plastic Co Ltd:
I have never heard about this comply before but after reading more about the work they do I was really impressed as they are making an impact in the plastic recycling industry in China.Their main products are PE and PP woven coating fabrics, printing paper molds, triplicate composite aluminum, blowing bags, printing of bump version. I had never thought that these items could be made and would provide an effective suction to the plastic waste.
2)Kuusakoski Recycling:
This company is working in another industry in China and recycling the wasted produced in China to process waste materials from the electronics industry. They provide uncomplicated recycling solutions for the electronics industry on a global scale. All waste materials from production processes can be utilised in some way. Electrical equipment can be recycled by reusing it or by processing the components into raw materials. Important stages in the recycling of electrical equipment include the sorting of plastics and the recovery of precious metals.I found this really interesting because we see a lot of waste in the electronics industry and I always wondered how would that waste be recycled and this seems like a good solution to it.
They also see the aluminum in the different forms. They produce recycled aluminium for foundries and steel mills and supply it to the international market in different forms:
- Aluminium ingots
- Aluminium drops
- Aluminium scraps
This shows the ways in which different sorts of wastes could be recycled.
Techniques Used in China for Recycling Plastic:
1)Turn disposable cups into sturdy materials:
2)Collect street sweepings and reuse them.
3)Green Waste – This can be anything from leaves to grass trimmings to flower cuttings that can be decomposed and then recycled. This will in turn produce what is called green waste.
4) Sort the waste, shred, make pellets and then and make household products from it such as boards, jewelry, trays etc. This is what Precious Plastic in Shanghai is also doing.
5) 3-D print the plastics which are recycled
Yes, these techniques are replicable and in future for my final project I am also trying to look at plastic and make something interesting out of it and find some novel techniques which can be used in a larger scale and be replicable.
Impact and Evaluation
These techniques above have been greatly useful in many ways by companies around the world and we can evaluate them using
Interesting Plastic Solutions (Using the “Bio-Thinking” Framework). They are safe as they do not cause any sort of pollutants for the environment and they also do not create any harmful fumes and only the safe plastics are used and PVC isn’t used which would be harmful for the environment. Moreover, it will be very efficient because plastic has a long life and is produced effectively and efficiently using plastic as it would have been made without the plastic. If we see the cyclic factor that that would be random because some plastics are recyclable and some plastics are not recyclable. If we look at the solar factor then some of the products are using less engird and some are using more energy. For instance, the 3-D printed and the ones using the machineless would be using a lot of energy whereas, the hand made ones without the used of machinery use consume very little amount of energy.
References:
https://www.chinadailyhk.com/articles/85/48/241/1550217148425.html
http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2018-12/01/c_137644567.htm
https://www.kuusakoski.com/en/china/
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