Help to Sort School Waste

The 4 local authorities in Dublin have come together with the charity VOICE Ireland to partner on a project to help schools manage their waste better. 

Dublin City Council, Fingal County Council, South Dublin County Council and Dún Laoghaire–Rathdown County Council have created two new video guides based on best practices in school waste management. 

The ‘Sorted – How to Reduce, Segregate and Manage School Waste’ videos aim to assist schools to reduce waste and improve waste segregation.  

Schools encounter a complex and broad range of waste, from food to packaging. A fit-for-purpose strategy is required to manage this waste in a sustainable manner. Some of the major benefits schools can see from an effective and well-planned waste system include; reduced waste bills, less litter around the school, increased protection of the environment, reduced contamination and compliance with regulations.

Leading the Way

As schools play a major role in modelling good behaviour for children, a good recycling system and reuse strategy can also shape lifelong sustainable habits.  

However, planning an effective waste management system can be difficult within the demands of a busy school environment. To assist schools, two informative video guides have been created. Both videos were filmed at Howth Road Mixed National School, Dublin 3. These videos collect and share best practices from Irish primary and secondary schools.  

Videos

Video one is designed for staff and outlines the basic principles of a school waste system. For example, it explains how and where to install bin stations. The video outlines how schools can encourage sustainability and a circular economy on their campus. The circular economy aims to keep materials and products in use for as long as possible. Examples that have been proven to work in Irish schools include uniform swaps, book rentals and reusable water bottle initiatives.

Video two is designed to assist a pupil-led environmental or Green Schools committee seeking to improve recycling rates and tackle unnecessary waste in their school.   

The videos are freely available to all schools in Gaeilge and English and can be streamed online here

About Recycle IT

Recycle IT is an award-winning social enterprise providing recycling collection and drop-off services for all types of waste electrical, electronic equipment (WEEE) and pure metal items.

Recycle IT services are provided in partnership with WEEE Ireland. Recycle IT is supported by the Department of Rural and Community Development, Dormant Accounts Fund, Pobal, South Dublin County Council and authorized by the National Waste Collection Permit Office and the local authorities across Leinster.

Recycle IT collect and safely recycle all types of electrical, electronic and metal items free from school in Dublin and surrounding areas.

For further details about our School Recycling Service, call us on 01 4578321, email info@recycleit.ie or visit the Recycle IT website at www.recycleit.ie

PC and Laptop Hard Disk Drives!

Did you know that multinational Hard Disk Drive producers Seagate and Western Digital share over 85% of the market? Correspondingly, the growth or decline in hard drive shipments for desktops and laptops by both Seagate and Western Digital are closely related to global desktop and laptop sales.

Worldwide PC shipments totalled 68 million units in the third quarter of 2022, a 19.5% decrease from the third quarter of 2021, according to preliminary results by Gartner, Inc. This is the steepest market decline since Gartner began tracking the PC market in the mid-1990s and the fourth consecutive quarter of year-over-year decline. 

The Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) PC market decreased 26.4% year-over-year in the third quarter, reaching 17 million units – the steepest decline among all regions. This is the third negative quarter for the EMEA PC market following a boom at the start of the pandemic.

“Multiple factors led to significant deterioration in the EMEA PC market, including challenging macroeconomic conditions, declining business and consumer demand and high levels of inventory,” said Kitagawa. “Additionally, many PC vendors shuttered operations in Russia in the first two quarters of this year, which negatively impacted overall shipments and is particularly visible across year-to-year comparisons.”

Statista report, In 2021, global unit shipments of hard disk drives (HDDs) fell to 258.9 million units, a 2% fall from the 260.3 million units shipped in the previous year. People are still buying a lot of storage.

Creating Data

Even with PC sales slowing we are all still large consumers of information and we’re buying lots of electronic equipment which includes hard disk drives (HDD) to store business and personal customer data including photos of everything from our kids to bank statements and passwords.

Did you know that 90% of the data on the internet has been created since 2016? This is according to an IBM Marketing Cloud study which suggests individuals, organizations, and devices have all become data creators who are turning out vast amounts of information to the internet daily.

Storage

Today data can be stored on computers, game consoles, external hard drives, mobile phones, tablets, memory cards, memory keys or many other storage devices. Both business and personal data are stored and can be valuable to others. Information like credit card information, photos, email addresses, passwords, address details, medical history and much more.

So if you are upgrading to a new computer device (desktop computer, phone, laptop, tablet, etc.) please arrange for the removal of the hard drive at the same time as recycling the computer!

It’s important to remain mindful of removing, erasing and destroying data which is important to you.

What to Do next?

The key to destroying your computer HDD is ensuring the drive can’t ever spin again. The physical destruction of the drive means increased confidence that stored data is obliterated and can never be used again. This is the method to Recycle IT practice.

In the interest of time and money, you don’t need to destroy the full PC or laptop, just the hard disk drive (HDD) which is a small box inside of a computer, server or laptop.

How to Destroy Hard Disk Drives 

If you are disposing of an old computer with a hard drive, it’s best to physically destroy the hard drive just to be 100% certain that the old data is completely destroyed.

Recycle IT use trained personal and electronic tools to ensure the HDD is physically destroyed. This method is an ideal option for the disposal of home or office hard drives.

Safety in Destruction

Our team takes every precaution from wearing protective goggles, gloves, and a dust mask for the mouth and nose when cutting into the metal drive. They can cut right through the drive, from one side to the other multiple times ensuring the platters and the controller board are shattered.  Recycle IT can also provide destruction and disposal certification depending on your needs.

Finally

No matter who or what method you choose, it’s best to arrange the destruction of old hard drives containing important information before or at the time of recycling your computers, laptops, phones, etc.  Recycle IT offer the service and the opportunity to view the destruction process.

About Recycle IT

Recycle IT is an award-winning, not-for-profit, social enterprise established to create employment and promote environmental awareness through recycling and reuse. We work in partnership with WEEE Ireland and are authorized by your local authority to provide electrical, electronic and pure metal recycling collections across Dublin since 2007. Recycle IT are fully compliant for WEEE collection with permit detail available here.

To speak with Recycle IT please call 01 4578321 or email us here

Visit our website www.recycleit.ie

Goals

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) aim to transform our world. They are a call to action to end poverty and inequality, protect the planet, and ensure that all people enjoy health, justice and prosperity.

Leaving no one behind and reaching the furthest behind first are central commitments given under the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development (the 2030 Agenda) and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

The themes of inclusion, tolerance and empowerment run throughout Agenda 2030.

Commitments

The objective of the 2030 Agenda is that all people, in all countries, are to benefit from the achievement of the SDGs and the full realisation of human rights.

“As we embark on this great collective journey, we pledge that no one will be left behind. Recognizing that the dignity of the human person is fundamental, we wish to see the Goals and targets met for all nations and peoples and for all segments of society. And we will endeavour to reach the furthest behind first.” 2030 Agenda, paragraph 4

As part of the 2030 Agenda, 193 United Nation Member States committed to

• achieving more inclusive economies and societies;
• ending discrimination;
• empowering women and girls;
• reducing inequalities,
• ending extreme poverty.

Progress 

In order to progress work in this area the  Department of the Environment, Climate and Communications has arranged a meeting of the National Stakeholder Forum that will take place on Tuesday 17 January, Online and in the Aviva Stadium, Dublin from 10.30am – 4.30pm. (Open to all once you register)

The Forum meeting will focus on the key principle of Agenda 2030 for Sustainable Development of Leaving No One Behind.

We would like to hear from you about what you believe national and local policymakers should take into account when developing policy to ensure that no one is left behind.

The messages developed as part of this meeting will be shared across national and local governments and will be used as part of the development of Sustainable Development Goals training for civil servants and local authority officers.

We would like this to be an open and inclusive conversation.

Everyone is welcome and every effort will be made to meet the needs of all participants.

The Event

The event will include speakers talking about their lived experiences, workshops, performances and a panel discussion. A full agenda will be made available on this page shortly.

Those attending in person will be invited to attend workshops to develop key messages for national and local policymakers in respect of Leaving No One Behind.

Those attending online will have the opportunity to contribute to the development of these key messages through polls and questions and answers.

Additional information on in-person and online attendance will be made available following registration.

Registration

Registration for the event is now open. Please click here to register.

Background

Ireland played a central role in the development of the SDGs. Our then Ambassador to the UN, Mr David Donoghue, and the Kenyan Ambassador Macharia Kamau were appointed co-facilitators of the final phase of intergovernmental negotiations.

The agreement of the 2030 Agenda and the Paris Agreement on Climate Change made 2015 a landmark year in international cooperation towards a sustainable world, and the Department of Environment, Climate and Communications (DECC) plays a key role in both agendas.

To learn more please click here

About Recycle IT

Recycle IT is a not-for-profit social enterprise providing collection and drop-off services for all types of waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE). Yearly Recycle IT offered drop-off and collection services to thousands of homes and organisations across Dublin and surrounding areas collecting a range of WEEE which includes thousands of computers, televisions, toasters, cables, lawnmowers, monitors, microwaves and kettles.

Recycle IT services are provided in partnership with WEEE Ireland. Recycle IT is supported by South Dublin County Council and authorized by the National Waste Collection Permit Office and the local authorities across Leinster.

Visit our website for further details.

Support for Social Entrepreneurs

Google.org is providing €500,000 to support social entrepreneurs grow their organisations. The funding for Ireland is being shared with two organisations with the goal of helping social entrepreneurs scale their ideas and deliver impact. These groups are Social Entrepreneurs Ireland and INCO.

Adaire Fox-Martin, head of Google Ireland, said “By providing the sector better access to capital, talent, markets and technology, businesses such as Google have the opportunity to meaningfully serve the communities Social Enterprise operate in and advance impactful humanitarian and environmental causes.”

Social Entrepreneurs Ireland will use the funding to run the Changing Ireland Accelerator Programme, a 12-month initiative for underserved social entrepreneurs needing support to accelerate their impact.

Running parallel to the accelerator, which is now open for submissions, INCO will disperse the funding as cash sub-grants administered to participants.

Adaire Fox-Martin added “These grants reflect Google’s continued commitment to supporting social entrepreneurs around the world and to the principle that entrepreneurship can be the best way to tackle some of the world’s greatest challenges,”

The selection process will launch in February 2023, with successful applicants appointed to the accelerator programme from June 2023.

Social Entrepreneurs Ireland

The mission of Social Entrepreneurs Ireland is to find people with solutions to social problems and support them on every step of their journey.  This is achieved through a range of programmes, direct funding and our incredible community of alumni, funders, and sector leaders.  Since our foundation in 2004, Social Entrepreneurs Ireland has supported more than 500 social entrepreneurs across the country.

INCO

INCO is a global non-profit that has a presence across more than 40 countries. Since 2021, it has been leading StartSocial, an initiative supported by Google.org to provide funding and capacity-building to more than 400 social enterprises across Europe.

At the launch event Mathieu Planchard, global head of development at INCO stated, “This initiative represents a concrete step towards building a more diverse and inclusive entrepreneurial ecosystem,”

Mathieu added, “The combination of capacity-building support and strategic grant funding is the right recipe to break down the barriers faced by underserved founders in Ireland today.”

• To learn more about google.org click here
• To learn more about Social Entrepreneurs Ireland click here
• To learn more about INCO click here

About Recycle IT

Recycle IT is a not-for-profit social enterprise providing collection and drop-off services for all types of waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE). Yearly Recycle IT offered drop-off and collection services to thousands of homes and organisations across Dublin and surrounding areas collecting a range of WEEE which includes thousands of computers, televisions, toasters, cables, lawnmowers, monitors, microwaves and kettles.

Recycle IT services are provided in partnership with WEEE Ireland. Recycle IT is supported by South Dublin County Council and authorized by the National Waste Collection Permit Office and the local authorities across Leinster.

Visit our website for further details.