(ANSA) Sao Paulo, September 12 - Reducing the consumption of
plastic, recycling and treating waste: these are concepts that
year by year gain increasing space in Brazil and the whole
world. And yet, there is another type of waste that merits
attention: that of wire and other tyes of electrical cables.
Used in electronic products, and in the construction
industry, wires and cables require specific disposal and can
also be reused, thus gaining a new destination in the cycle of
consumption.
According to Wallyson Ferreira, of the Brazilian company
EcoRobust, a pioneer in the production of equipment and
machinery for recycling wires and cables in the South American
country, the ideal thing would be above all that people and
businesses avoid using fire in the disposal of these materials.
"Back in the day, the separation of plastic and metal from
the wires and cables was done in an inadequate way, by burning
or burying, which led to the pollution of water or the soil,"
explained Ferreira in an interview with ANSA. "We, instead," he
added, "have developed machines that work in the dry. They do
not produce any environmental damage, because they use air to
make the separation. It's 100% ecological".
The company, which was set up five years ago, on a family
basis, in a space of 300 square metres at Sumaré, is today in
full expansion, and exports equipment to Mexico, Chile, Peru and
Argentina. " We're about to move to another space, with more
than 1,000 square metres available," Ferreira said.
Considering that an electrical wire contains 40% of its mass
in plastic and 60% in copper, and a recycling machine can
process about a tonne of electrical cables per day, it is
possible to accumulate in a year 365 recycled tonnes, of which
146 tonnes of plastic and 219 of copper. With the two materials
separated, both the plastics and the metal can be reused
industrially.
"Firms can commercialize copper and plastic, selling them to
third parties, or they can choose to use them to make more wires
or cables", explained the representative of EcoRobust. "This
process is called inverted production", he explained. According
to Ferreira, in future businesses will have to think about the
whole cycle of materials which they use: "not only in
production, but also in inverted production ".
As well as the ecological advantages, inverted production
also produces financial revenue, which ends up attracting ever
increasing numbers of interested parties. "The world is starting
to realise that it is really worth recycling objects and
materials, because in the end you end up having environmental
and financial advantages", said the representative of EcoRobust,
who will present its machines at Wire South America, one of the
world's most important research centres in the great fairs of
Latin America in the sector of wires and cables.
The next edition will run from 1 al 3 October at the Sao
Paulo Expo, in Sao Paulo, and will be organized by CIPA Fiera
Milano.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED © Copyright ANSA