How eThekwini Municipality is looking after the environment during the COVID-19 lockdown – Featured Durban Blog

While all of us stay at home and stay safe the eThekwini Municipality continues to help communities throughout the area.

This month we look at some of the ways the Municipality is looking after the environment during the lockdown:

When the COVID-19 pandemic is finished there will still be many unemployed people. There will be many challenges for the government, NGO’s and the private sector. New ways to earn income are going to be essential if South Africans want to make a living.

It is for this reason that eThekwini Municipality funds and supports initiatives like Green Corridors, the NPO which has developed ‘green’ spaces around the Municipalities communities. The aim is to help them thrive in balance with the habitats around them. Hopefully these programmes will pave the way for communities to access economic opportunities that work hand-in-hand with environmental solutions.

Green Corridors has been working on innovations that deal with urban challenges such as waste and litter collection and the removal and repurposing of them. At the same time they are developing a model for the process to be community managed for the creation of small localized economies.

The KwaMashu Materials Beneficiation Centre is one of the NPO’s pilot programmes.

Here a small team work with technical consultant project manager Jonathan Welch to find solutions to how waste can be repurposed and monetized. This process means the waste is removed and economic opportunities are provided for the community.  This helps the ecosystem and the community to improve and thrive.

‘’Much of our waste is not recyclable in traditional ways,’’ said Welch. However thanks to help from Duncan Doo of Pyrolysis Group, Green Corridors is ready to begin manufacturing the ‘’Ocean Paver’’. This uses unrecyclable plastic waste that is collected from litter booms in the tributaries of the Umgeni River, which is mixed with crushed glass bottles collected within the communities and made into square pavers for walkways similar to concrete pavers used in landscaping and driveways. 

These litter booms are rubber booms that are slung across rivers to gather plastic and floating waste, stopping tons of plastic and waste from being washed into our ocean. The collection of this waste provides economic opportunities for communities to work.  The waste is used at the Beneficiation Centre.

The Centre works much like a ‘’laboratory’’ to see how resources can be used. ‘’We are now piloting a programme to see how these waste removal  and repurposing processes can be funnelled into creating employment for communities and provide revenue streams,’’ said Welch.

The City’s Parks and Recreation Department is also providing waste grass and cuttings to the Centre to create Bokashi (anaerobic i.e. non CO2 releasing decomposition) compost which can then be used in community vegetable gardens / schools / by the City for use in parks and green spaces.

The Centre is also using fibre harvested from invasive alien plants and combining it with concrete to make green pavers. They have also successfully used builders’ rubble encased in welded wire cages to make a gabion retaining wall. This can be used to stop erosion or create stability for slopes. This simple skill might just be able to help unemployed people create some sort of income by using very little finance.

‘’The programme has been funded and supported by eThekwini Municipality’s Economic Development Unit and the Roads and Stormwater Department as one of the endeavours to remove plastic waste from the City’s rivers and to create a circular economy by turning the plastic and glass waste into a product with value,’’ explains Garry Cullen, Project Manager in the Economic Development Unit. The Municipality has done tests on the Ocean Paver and found that they are twice the strength, resistant to chipping and slightly lighter than an equivalent concrete slab.

These products could just be a sustainable solution to take out waste from our environment, reducing the size of landfills and creating new sustainable small businesses that create much needed economic activity and jobs for unemployed people post-COVID-19.

For more info visit: https://durbangreencorridor.co.za/

During the lockdown period the Cleansing and Solid Waste Unit (DSW) has been hard at work doing high pressure cleaning in high density areas such as taxi ranks and the central business district. This can only be achieved when the public adheres to the lockdown rules and helps to contribute to a cleaner city.

The Cleansing and Solid Waste Unit (DSW) provides you with these useful tips on what to do with your waste:

The Kerbside Orange Bag Recycling Programme will begin again on 1 June 2020.

Residents are encouraged to limit the amount of recyclables generated and to rather reuse or up-cycle or store recyclables on their properties.

The City would like to thank residents for using this programme and apologise for any inconvenience caused.

For refuse removal enquiries, residents can contact the DSW Helpline on 031 311 8804

For more info visit: www.durban.gov.za