Precis

Scientist Veena Sahajwalla is a recycling superstar with some bold new ideas about how to save waste from landfill.

As Australia's collective garbage guilt builds alongside the tonnes of plastic piling up in recycling depots, her innovative inventions may offer some exciting new solutions.

Inspired walking the streets of her Mumbai neighbourhood as a child, Veena observed almost everything was reused and "nothing was wasted".

This can-do attitude shaped her engineering career and sowed the seeds for some ground-breaking ideas, including making steel from car tyres.

Now she's unveiling her latest invention, a "micro factory" that creates building materials and tiles from dumped clothes and glass.

It’s a revolutionary concept. But will it work outside the lab?

Veena walks across landfill dump

KYLIE WALKER, CEO AUSTRALIAN ACADEMY OF TECHNOLOGY AND ENGINEERING: Veena is known as the “Waste Queen”. She is transforming the way in which we manage waste, not just in Australia,

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but across the world.

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Veena at landfill dump

Music

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PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: I see waste as an opportunity. To me, waste is really one of those untapped resources,

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just waiting to be harnessed.

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Loaders dump rubbish

Here in Australia, we are sitting at that tipping point. We have seen the export bans on waste come about and we can no longer send it somewhere overseas and it then becomes somebody else’s problem.

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We have to solve it, we have to do something about it.

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Veena at dump

RAMA MAHAPATRA, VEENA’S HUSBAND: Veena is absolutely obsessed with waste.

Veena: "All of this polypropylene easy to be remanufactured right here in Australia, this should not be wasted."

RAMA MAHAPATRA, VEENA’S HUSBAND: And you can see from some of the work she’s done,

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she completely steps out of the box to solve the problem.

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Veena at recycling plant

KYLIE WALKER, CEO AUSTRALIAN ACADEMY OF TECHNOLOGY AND ENGINEERING: Twenty years ago, she invented a way to recycle tyres into the steel making process and saved millions of tyres from going into landfill. Now she's invented a new product that combines

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the textiles from old clothes with glass and turns them into a product for the building industry.

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Plastic into recycling

ANIRBAN GHOSE, MICRO FACTORY ENGINEER, UNSW: It’s a paradigm shift. We have had the Industrial Revolution, we’ve now got this technical revolution. I think she’s talking

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about a materials revolution.

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Veena amongst plastic waste

PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: So what you can see behind me here is plastics and other waste materials some of this is destined for landfill, but we can use these materials as building blocks for making new materials for new manufacturing and new circular economies.

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Truck tips rubbish

Australia really cannot continue to assume that it's business as usual. 

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And I think we need to be bold and brave and think big.

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Rubbish dump. GFX Title:
THE TIPPING POINT

Music

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Veena at home in kitchen sorting through recycling

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PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA:  My husband and my kids, they would absolutely define me as the mega hoarder. I don't see myself as a hoarder. I just see myself as somebody who is curious.

TARA MAHAPATRA, DAUGHTER: I think Mum had a

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TARA MAHAPATRA
daughter

few funny quirks that made her a little bit different to other mums.

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Veena at home in kitchen sorting through recycling

She was definitely the rubbish cop, really making sure if we were going to throw something, did it need to be thrown? Could we use it?

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Rama 100%. Super:
RAMA MAHAPATRA
husband

RAMA MAHAPATRA, VEENA’S HUSBAND: Before I take the garbage outside she’ll make sure she goes through the entire garbage.

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Recycling at Veena's

Things like yoghurt boxes. I just throw it, but she’ll just go and pick it up. We have a place in the house. I call it waste collection centre. And, you know, we’ve got all kinds of stuff there.

PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA:  You know what, I really

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Veena at home surrounded by recycling collection

like to pick out of garbage is all these exciting products that have potentially valuable materials in it. Like in this case you can see this shiny metallic layer and that’s what I like to harness and that becomes part of my collection.

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And this is really how a lot of my research journey starts in all kinds of incredibly wonderful materials. So every time I collect enough of these materials, it comes with me to the office.

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Ext. UNSW SMaRT Centre

ANIRBAN GHOSE, MICRO FACTORY ENGINEER, UNSW: I've been working with Veena for over five years now at the SMaRT Centre,

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Inside SMaRT Centre. Staff at work

and it's always had a team of about 30 people, of passionate young engineers and scientists working in the space of waste recycling.

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Veena arrives with recycling materials

Veena is the director, and keeping up with Veena is the challenge.

Veena: "Well hello, hello."

Keith: "Hello. What do you have what have you brought for us."

Veena: "Lots of goodies, right."

ANIRBAN GHOSE, MICRO FACTORY ENGINEER, UNSW: She will not stop talking about

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Anirban 100%. Super:
ANIRBAN GHOSE
engineer SMaRT Centre

science and engineering and technology, it's from one idea to the next. It’s part of everything that she does.

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Veena shows packaging materials to Anirban and Keith

The kind of materials that Veena is bringing in, they’re either mixed in such in such a way that conventional recycling can’t currently recycle it, or it’s a material that people haven’t valued.

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Keith: "Maybe HGPE and LGPE for the cover."

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ANIRBAN GHOSE, MICRO FACTORY ENGINEER, UNSW: I don’t know how often I have opened up a chip packet and gone this has great aluminium in it!

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Keith and Veena examine packaging

Keith: "It’s aluminium."

Veena: "Yeah, exactly."

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KEITH MONAGHAN, UNSW ENGINEER: The materials that we have collected here,

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Keith 100%. Super:
KEITH MONAGHAN
engineer SMaRT Centre

we can see and understand the value that is locked up in these materials.

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Keith and Veena examine packaging

Veena: "So I think someone needs to look at that."

Anirban: "Absolutely."

Keith: "I think that’s potentially a good project."

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PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: Well, you know, there’s so much stuff that we just throw away and we just take it for granted, but you know,

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PROF. VEENA SAHAJWALLA
scientist & engineer, UNSW Sydney

growing up in Mumbai, in India, where I was born there was no such thing as a waste. Everything had value and everything had potential.

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Mumbai street GVs. Super:
December 2019, Mumbai

Music

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PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA:  Mumbai is a city that is the industrial heartland of India. Population of more than 20 million.

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And it’s got an amazing buzz to it.

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Veena walking on path beside sea with mother

Veena: "You remember I used to go for the yoga where was it, the one on Marine Drive."

PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: I try and go back to Mumbai about once a year

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and take my family with me.

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Photo. Veena with mother and brother

I’m one of two kids. Growing up I was very close to my family,

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but particularly really, really very close to my mother.

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Veena with her mother

Veena:  "5 ‘clock in the morning I remember you used to get up and you used to walk to the milk depot to go and get milk for the family."

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Photo. Veena, mother, father, brother

RAMA MAHAPATRA, VEENA’S HUSBAND: Veena’s mum was a doctor. She was actually a paediatrician. You know, her mum was working and looking after the house and doing everything.

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So that really inspired Veena a lot.

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Veena and family share meal

Veena: "I remember also when you used to make a big Sindhi curries. Sindhi curry I remember because you used to make it big, Sindhi curry is like well you explain."

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PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: For my mother it was absolutely anything is possible. Do what you love, but do it at your very best and be your best.

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Indira Sahajwalla: Ganeesh. Ganeesh. his name was Ganeesh. He fractured his toe."

Tara: "Lucky you‘re a doctor."

Indira: "I gave him straightaway plaster."

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DR INDIRA SAHAJWALLA

DR INDIRA SAHAJWALLA, VEENA’S MOTHER: My expectation was is that all women should be on the top, they should never be under any man, that’s even today. I’m talking for all women.

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Veena talks with mother

PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: My parents were absolutely the ones who inspired us to be

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curious about things.

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Veena walks in Mumbai

Music

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PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA:  You know, as a kid in Mumbai there is so much to see and I’d see people working, repairing shoes. People carting all kinds of heavy things on their heads, for example. An old discarded radio for instance, that they would feel that they could they could

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fix it and use it.

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Man fixing electronics on street

Even today, there is a big part of the economy that operates off the back of repairing things.

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And how amazing is that?

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Veena in Mumbai shop watching man sort materials

PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: All these experiences that I had as a child growing up it, I think, had a role to play in what got into my system, into my DNA.

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Photos. Young Veena at uni

Amongst my female friends, I was probably quite unusual in pursuing my love for science and engineering. As the only woman in the class,

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that was a bit isolating.

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Photo. Veena graduation

By the time I graduated, I finished top of the class. Some of the male colleagues

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I’m sure were not entirely delighted.

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Photos. Veena and Rama

RAMA MAHAPATRA, VEENA’S HUSBAND: I met Veena in Vancouver, Canada. We both studied metallurgical engineering. And Veena, joined as a graduate student, just started her Masters. There was a

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potential clash because I was absolutely a clean freak.

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Super:
RAMA MAHAPATRA
husband and engineer

But she was kind of a little bit messy because she just wanted to keep reusing things and I wanted to throw things.

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Photo. Rama cooking.

PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: Rama and I started to go out and when it all became very serious our parents were informed and they

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Photo. Rama and Veena on couch with friends

weren’t too happy that Rama and I as students had really decided that we were going to get married. But the other

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important thing that bothered them was the fact that this was their role.

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RAMA MAHAPATRA, VEENA’S HUSBAND: A lot of the marriages in India are, you know, arranged marriages. I had to ask my parents for their permission.

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Photo. Rama and Veena

So I had to send them a photo, Veena had to do the same thing. Her parents were actually

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trying to do, some investigation to find a little bit more about me. I guess they must have found something good.

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Photos. Veena and Rama wedding

In the end, we got married whilst we were doing our studies.

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Ferry, Sydney Harbour

PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: So I came to Australia after finishing up my PhD

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Photo. Veena, Sydney Harbour

in the States and eventually came to UNSW.

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Veen stands before wales of waste

Around about in 2000 and thereabouts, I really got excited about you know researching more of waste materials as resources for steelmaking.

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Veena Steel plant

People were too reliant on traditional coal and coke, no one was really

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looking at some of these other alternatives.

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Landfill dumping

KYLIE WALKER, CEO AUSTRALIAN ACADEMY OF TECHNOLOGY AND ENGINEERING: Around about this time, there was a growing awareness of the problem of plastic pollution. We understood that plastics don't break down or they take thousands and thousands of years to break down. And Veena had this idea to take those plastic bottles

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that were starting to fill up the ground and the ocean,

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Super:
KYLIE WALKER
CEO Australian Academy of Technology and Engineering

using them to replace coke, a fossil fuel, in the process of making steel.

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Plastic steel making lab

She called that idea green steel.

Veena: "What we’re going to do is we’re actually going to be feeding in our plastics sample in there

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Super: Catalyst, 2004

and the idea is we want to be able to inject it into this furnace here."

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PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: I started working on the idea of using waste plastics in the lab and the experiments started to work.

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It was exciting.

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Lab furnace

You know, it’s one thing to do these incredibly amazing experiments in the lab, but a whole other ball game when you have to actually take it out into practice, into actual commercially operating furnaces. So there was quite a lot of work to be done.

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Program excerpt. New Inventors.

James: "Hello I’m James O’Loghlin. Welcome to the New Inventors…

JAMES O’ LOGHLIN, BROADCASTER AND AUTHOR: 2005 I was hosting the New Inventors.

James:  "On our panel tonight is Professor Veena Sahajwalla…"

JAMES O’ LOGHLIN, BROADCASTER AND AUTHOR: Producers were looking for some more judges and they discovered this woman

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James 100%. Super:
JAMES O'LOGHLIN
broadcaster and author

who was an industrial innovator and doing some amazing work with steel, and in particular, green steel.

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Veena in make-up, on set of New Inventors

PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: I was you know approached by a producer, it was a bit of a surprise, and you know I was like,

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‘Gosh, am I prepared for this?’  I mean like this is not my day job.

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New Inventors excerpt

James: "Veena, what do you think?"

Veena: "You’ve been very creative in using the operator’s shoulder as a means to support the cam boom."

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JAMES O’ LOGHLIN, BROADCASTER AND AUTHOR: She always used to ask me after we’d done a show -- or even in rehearsal, actually -- how did that sound? What could I do better?

Veena: "What are the advantages of your system compared to the others?"

JAMES O’ LOGHLIN, BROADCASTER AND AUTHOR: She was very humble, but Veena

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had a lot not to be humble about. She was doing amazing work, and in some ways world changing work.

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Eureka Prize announcement

And then shortly after she joined the New Inventors, she won the Eureka Prize.

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Presenter: "The 2005 UNSW Eureka Prize for Scientific Research, Professor Veena Sahajwalla."

PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: A colleague of mine had to literally

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nudge me off the chair, going, 'They’ve called your name'.

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Veena at Eureka Prize ceremony

Announcer: "Professor Veena Sahajwalla’s research has shown the steel industry how to use waste plastic bottles to make steel. It’s been a hard sell in a conservative industry."

KYLIE WALKER, CEO AUSTRALIAN ACADEMY OF TECHNOLOGY AND ENGINEERING: The Eureka Prizes, they're really

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considered to be the Oscars of Australian science and the one that Veena won is really the pinnacle of scientific achievement in Australia.

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Veena has photo taken at prize ceremony

Her invention was ground-breaking because she went beyond the traditional notions of recycling and reusing and turned the plastic into a resource,

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but the pressure was on now for Veena to demonstrate that she could make her idea work in the real world and commercialise it.

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Veena in lam

PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: Now the time had come when actually the work of implementation at a steel plant had to happen. We had to work out where plastics would come from.

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We really needed an affordable cost-effective source.

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Discarded tyres. Veena among tyres

Well, in Australia, each year millions of these kinds of tyres end up in landfill. The rubber in tyres, like many waste plastics, is actually a really good source of carbon. So I remember thinking back then that this could be a fantastic substitute for some of the coal that could be used in electric arc furnace steelmaking to make green steel.

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Furnace

MICHAEL DAVIES, STEELMAKING CONSUMABLES, MOLYCOP: I was working at One Steel Sydney steel mill in the early 2000s. The management were very interested in Veena’s idea.

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Veena walks with Steel worker

Veena: "This is some of the material?"

Steel plant worker: "Yeah, this is what we call our nut coke pile."

MICHAEL DAVIES, STEELMAKING CONSUMABLES, MOLYCOP: Plant trials demonstrated that rubber granules could be used as a replacement for coke.

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Michael 100%. Super:
MICHAEL DAVIES
Steelmaking Consumable, Molycop

In 2011, the green steel technology was introduced to Sydney Steel Mill, followed by the electric arc furnace in Melbourne and then taken overseas.

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Veena at steelmaking

PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: When the technology was actually getting commercialised, we were actually replacing more than a third

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of the coal-based carbon through waste tyres.

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KYLIE WALKER, CEO AUSTRALIAN ACADEMY OF TECHNOLOGY AND ENGINEERING: For a lot of Australian researchers, the bringing their idea to market,

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Kylie 100%. Super:
KYLIE WALKER
CEO Australian Academy of Technology and Engineering

the commercialisation of their work can be the valley of death. There aren’t many who make it through that and succeed.

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Photos. GFX. Veena with awards

So what Veena had done was really special. And this enabled her to attract the kind of funding and support that she needed to get started with her SMaRT centre.

ANIRBAN GHOSE, MICRO FACTORY ENGINEER, UNSW: After green steel Veena started about

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Anirban 100%. Super:
ANIRBAN GHOSE
engineer SMaRT Centre

what other materials are out there that are waste materials but have value,

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Veena at SMaRT Centre with electronics waste materials

other complex waste materials, such as e-waste.

PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: Well e-waste is actually one of the fastest growing waste streams in the world, you know, we’ve got so many different types of electronics, you know, our computers, our phones, and of course there’s a lot of good quality plastics in there and, you know, typically a lot of this e-waste plastics will end up going to landfill.

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Keith 100% Super:
KEITH MONAGHAN
engineer SMaRT Centre

KEITH MONAGHAN, ENGINEER SMART CENTRE, UNSW: So Veena was able to develop a process that we could take those plastics, reprocess them and produce 3D printing filament from them.

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Veena in lab, filament production

PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: The plastics from e-waste gets fed into this machine, this then gets converted into plastic filaments which are basically like spaghetti, and of course these types of plastic filaments get used as a feedstock for 3D printing. One of the first products that we did with

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Machine prints Ghandi glasses

3D printing was a pair of Gandhi glasses and for Mahatma Gandhi's glasses to be that iconic set of glasses that everyone can recognise, was something that we wanted to showcase.

ANIRBAN GHOSE, MICRO FACTORY ENGINEER, UNSW: Veena was experimenting

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with a variety of waste materials, and one of the most promising out of it was the combination of problematic waste glass and combining that with waste textiles.

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Veena with waste textiles

PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA:  So, you know, each year tonnes of clothes and curtains get thrown away. There’s also a lot of glass that gets discarded ending up in landfill, and I think for us it was really about looking at really being innovative, doing a lot of experiments that allowed us to combine, you know, textiles and glass. But of course as you can imagine you know not every experiment works and not everything is successful at the start some of these things actually didn’t quite work. But after a lot of experimentation of course, we ended up producing these beautiful green ceramics and, of course, these have got this amazing designer-like look.

KEITH MONAGHAN, ENGINEER SMART CENTRE, UNSW: She got to the point

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that she had a product that could be marketed. The next step was how do we produce it and how do we take it out into the marketplace.

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Veena in micro factory

ANIRBAN GHOSE, MICRO FACTORY ENGINEER, UNSW: Veena really wanted to take an entrepreneurial route to actually get this product out into our communities and our homes, to be able to show that

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the science that’s developed in these labs over many years can have real impact in our communities and solve real waste challenges.

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Textile reuse in micro factory

We started designing components and machinery. And that package we’ve ended up calling a micro factory. A micro factory is

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a series of modules that can take a variety of different waste materials

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Textile reuse in micro factory

and transform it into a new product.

PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: This is the prototype micro factory for green ceramics. Textiles is one of the input materials that goes into making green ceramics.

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Veena interview in micro factory

We combine our glass, textiles, and in our micro factory this gets converted into a hard green ceramics.

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We are actually with our micro factories re-imagining what manufacturing could look like in the future.

KYLIE WALKER, CEO AUSTRALIAN ACADEMY OF TECHNOLOGY AND ENGINEERING: One of the ideas behind

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the micro factory is to really enable people and local communities to take control of their own waste.

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Veena in micro factory

The ideal location for these kinds of micro factories is where the waste is being collected -- local councils, regional centres -- so that you can really have communities able to access them and turn

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their own waste into a resource, into a small-scale industry.

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Veena in micro factory

PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: We currently have a grant for commercialisation of our micro factory, We have to deliver. As part of the grant, we have to show that we’re going to have a commercially operating micro factory that makes viable products.

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Music

18:45

Mirvac office interior. Natasha at desk

PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA:  2019 was really a big year for us because I got a phone call from someone at Mirvac. It was just amazing, because

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Veena 100%. Super:
PROF. VEENA SAHAJWALLA
scientist & engineer, UNSW Sydney

here I was, I’d been reaching out to the building sector for a long time.

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Natasha at desk

NATASHA RYKO, NATIONAL MARKETING DIRECTOR, RESIDENTIAL, MIRVAC: The building and construction industry contribute to 60 percent of waste

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Natasha 100%. Super:
NATASHA RYKO
National Marketing Director, Residential Mirvac

in Australia, which equates to around 41 million tonnes a year.

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Natasha at desk

We needed to come up with a sustainability initiative for a particular project. So I went away and did a little bit of research. I was extremely impressed by the work that Veena was doing And I just saw so many avenues that we could pursue.

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Natasha and Veena look at tables

ANIRBAN GHOSE, MICRO FACTORY ENGINEER, UNSW: The first project that Mirvac tested us out on was creating a few specific pieces. One of those was a dining table, made from our waste glass and textile product. There were some side tables that were made from waste corflute, banners that were collected here on campus.

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Veena:  "When you’ve got orientation week and all that and the banners come down."

PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: To actually see that in a real world setting was really

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almost that sort of goosebumps moment when you walk in then you go, ‘Oh my gosh, these are our prototypes’.

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Display apartment

NATASHA RYKO, NATIONAL MARKETING DIRECTOR, RESIDENTIAL, MIRVAC: After our first project, we asked Veena if she’d come on board with something a lot larger in scale and much more ambitious.

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Veena in apartment

PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: We’ve now actually put in another range. It’s gone into flooring applications, walling applications, and really all kinds of very creative applications. We consulted with the designers for the pieces in this apartment and most of the pieces are made out of glass and old clothes, except

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Veena shows wall

for this particular designer wall. They actually wanted a softer look, so in addition to glass we’ve incorporated jute bags. Jute is basically a plant and jute bags are strong and sturdy and they are used to store coffee beans.

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Display apartment

SUSAN LLOYD-HURWITZ, CEO AND MANAGING DIRECTOR, MIRVAC: I remember walking into the apartment and just being blown away by the variety of things that she’d been able to create

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Susan 100%. Super:
Susan LLOYD-HURWITZ
CEO and Managing Director, Mirvac

out of what would have been considered waste materials --   school uniforms, coffee bags and glass.

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Table made from waste materials

We've just been looking for ways to expand and take it further and further.

NATASHA RYKO, NATIONAL MARKETING DIRECTOR, RESIDENTIAL, MIRVAC: We talked about actually creating our own micro factory on site so that we could create

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and produce green ceramics for our projects.

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PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: That’s exactly what we’ve been looking at doing, is really taking people with us on that journey where they can reimagine themselves as manufacturers.

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Cootamundra aerial GV

Music

21:29

Andrew driving

ANDREW DOUGLAS, MATTRESS RECYCLER: I've been running a recycling business in Cootamundra. It's a small town. It's about four and a half hours south west of Sydney.

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Andrew unloads mattress

We mainly collect mattresses and tyres. We thought it'd be an easy process to recycle mattresses. We were

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Andrew 100%. Super:
ANDREW DOUGLAS
mattress recycler

a bit unprepared for what happens when you pull a mattress apart. You're left with lots of different materials.

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Mattress waste

It's been a passion of mine to look at problem waste. So it was trying to unlock the value of that mattress once you’ve deconstructed it and Veena was there to offer a guiding hand.

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Andrew at recycling plant, into micro factory in shed

PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: I met Andrew several years ago and he was really interested in the work that we were doing in recycling and started to show interest in our micro factories. Our first micro factory that’s going to be up and running commercially with green ceramics is, indeed, now going to be at Andrew’s site.

ANDREW DOUGLAS: This is where we're assembling the micro factory inside the small shed. A micro factory like this

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Andrew interview in shed

costs between half a million, a million dollars, but this one's being funded by the university grant.

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Micro factory

PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: As part of the grant we have to actually show that this micro factory is going to be running

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and ready, geared up, producing commercial products by about March. And that means we have to deliver.

22:45

Veena and Andrew walk with Natasha at building site

Veena: "Well, we’ve actually known Andrew for a while now."

Natasha: "How long is that?"

Veena: "A few years now."

Andrew: "Seven years, I think."

Veena: "Seven years, my goodness."

PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: We have been telling Mirvac about Andrew, and we’ve been telling him about Mirvac. So

22:53

Veena 100%

out of this, of course, conversation, new opportunities are emerging.

23:08

Demolition site. Veena sorts through waste materials

SUSAN LLOYD-HURWITZ, CEO AND MANAGING DIRECTOR, MIRVAC: So we’re redeveloping the old Channel Nine site in Sydney.

Veena: "There, that is so nice."

SUSAN LLOYD-HURWITZ, CEO AND MANAGING DIRECTOR, MIRVAC: There are electronics, there’s plastic, there’s computers, there’s desks.

23:13

Veena: "That is polycarbonate, right?"

Anirban: "It should be."

23:25

Susan 100%

SUSAN LLOYD-HURWITZ, CEO AND MANAGING DIRECTOR, MIRVAC: There’s a whole building full of materials.

23:28

Andrew carries materials from site to ute

Waste from this site is going to Andrew in Cootamundra to a micro factory there.

Veena: "This is really, really heavy."

SUSAN LLOYD-HURWITZ, CEO AND MANAGING DIRECTOR, MIRVAC: The idea is always, of course, to be circular in the economy and to get the waste

23:30

Susan 100%. Super:
Susan LLOYD-HURWITZ
CEO and Managing Director, Mirvac

to Andrew and then hopefully buy the things back then we can use them in our development.

23:44

Andrew returns to Cootamundra micro factory

ANDREW DOUGLAS, MATTRESS RECYCLER: I brought back a ute load of material from the Channel Nine site. It was a bit of an Aladdin's Cave in there.

23:49

There's some really useful stuff there for the green ceramic tile, particularly this big black curtain that they use behind the stage. It was perfect for what we want to do. I'm conscious we're coming up against a hard deadline

23:58

Andrew 100%. Super:
ANDREW DOUGLAS
mattress recycler

for a grant that the university received.

24:11

Anirban and Keith with Andrew at micro factory

Anirban and Keith have been tireless in coming down here and making sure we get the factory up and running. So the last couple of weeks

24:13

Andrew 100%

have been very difficult, but the guys have put a lot of effort in.

24:22

Veena and Keith with Andrew at micro factory

PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: Our whole team came down to Cootamundra today for a first major run of our micro factory.

Veena: "All set now, okay."

PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: It's been a long journey. And I think there were lots of us in there today feeling really emotional. The time had really

24:25

Veena 100%

arrived for us to literally flick the switch.

24:44

Veena, Anirban and Keith with Andrew at micro factory. Veena switches on plant

Veena: "You’re going to have to."

Andrew: "No."

Veena: "You're going to have to switch it on."

Veena: "Oh no, I don’t know, I mean come on Andrew. Oh, this is exciting. Okay, here we go."

PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: When we actually started producing the tiles, there was that sense of fear and also wonder as to what it might look like in this micro factory for the very first time.

24:47

But what was absolutely awesome to see that very first tile that that came out of out of the micro factory

25:14

Veena 100%

was simply brilliant.

25:20

Production of first tile

Andrew: "Oh, success!"

Veena: "That is great!"

PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: And it was actually fantastic to see almost that look on Andrew's face.

25:22

Veena: "Wow, that is amazing."

25:33

Andrew: "Well done team."

Keith: "That is brilliant. Well done."

25:35

PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: Andrew, who had really never been a manufacturer, he was now becoming a manufacturer, that's a big moment.

Veena: "It is fantastic."

PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: The plan is from here on to roll out this and other kinds of micro factories across Australia so we can deal with,

25:38

Veena 100%. Super:
PROF. VEENA SAHAJWALLA
scientist & engineer, UNSW Sydney

not only our glass and textile waste, but also transform all kinds of problematic waste.

25:56

Molycop steelmaking facility

Music

26:04

PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: Well, 2021 is really looking very exciting.  The first ever invention of mine, green steel, which is still going strong. And this year Molycop has started using green steel in their facility in Newcastle.

PETER MCCLURE, STEELMAKING TECHNOLOGY, MOLYCOP: Even though green steel technology’s been around

26:09

Peter 100%. Super:
PETER MCCLURE
Steelmaking Technology, Molycop

for over a decade, it’s even more relevant today than what it was back in the 2000s,

26:29

Molycop steelmaking facility

because our customers are demanding that the products that they purchase have been made from sustainable methods.

26:34

Veena and Peter at Molycop

PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: The next generation of green steel that we’re working on is

26:42

Veena 100%

really about showing that we can push those limits.

26:48

Veena and Peter at Molycop

Veena: "It’s a great sign that you can actually show that we're bringing in more rubber into the process."

We’re going to have more and more substitution of that coal with rubber tyres to get to that ultimate

26:52

Veena 100%

complete elimination of coal.

27:03

Veena climbs stairs at scrap yard

ANIRBAN GHOSE, MICRO FACTORY ENGINEER, UNSW: Veena's playing a critical role but it’s going to take an army of people like Veena to solve our current challenges in waste.

KYLIE WALKER, CEO AUSTRALIAN ACADEMY OF TECHNOLOGY AND ENGINEERING: In Australia, we have the skills and the technology to get to zero waste. What we need now is the will. We need the consumer will. We need the regulator and legislator will. And we bring all of those together,.

27:06

Kylie 100%

then we actually have the potential, I believe, to get to a zero -waste economy, a circular economy.

27:31

Veena at scrapyard

PROFESSOR VEENA SAHAJWALLA: You know, I am really confident that Australia can meet these challenges. When we start to see a future where people are going out and asking for resources and materials that come from waste streams, then I think we would see

27:37

Veena 100%

that we are at the cusp of that change. And that would be a really, really good thing when we’re all inspiring each other to do things better.

27:52

Veena at scrapyard

Music

28:01

Credits [see below]

28:15

Out point

28:44