Why is I.T. (information technology) so important for improving container glass recycling?
Success in making improvements is founded on decisions based on better information. In today's global market, there is lots of information available. The challenge is to obtain better information at a reasonable cost.
Glass Works is pleased to share with its readers increased access to new ideas, and conduits or links to other global sources of information on container glass through a new web site.
Why are we taking this challenge on?
Glass recycling must become sustainable on a practical level to enable Canadians to get full value from container glass regardless of where they are in the country. Distance, and its associated financial and environmental costs, make returning every bottle or jar back to a container glass furnace an unsustainable option for some communities. These facts have caused some communities frustration leading to container glass recycling being labeled as a problem.
However, Einstein summarized the correct response to these kinds of challenges, "the significant problems we face cannot be solved at the same level of thinking we where at when we created them."
How can we make the change to a different level of thinking? New information, new ways of looking at existing information and information applied differently through technological improvements are all ways of attaining the necessary changes.
Some of the problems faced seem to acquire a larger than life stature, so much so that they assume a high profile, becoming symbolic and then political. This has been the case with waste management, not just in Canada, but in many OECD countries. According to the authors of "Factor Four", the new report to the Club of Rome, "simply throwing money at a problem does not normally lead to elegant solutions." Some may argue that finding "elegant" solutions for waste management is like trying to mix oil and water. However, it is clear that improvements to current waste management technologies must be based on common sense and they have to be sustainable.
By providing better access to information Glass Works believes that this will help Canadians, interested in an environmentally sustainable economically viable future, read about new ideas and connect them directly to the idea generators. Look inside to see what the new web site offers.
Glass Works is a publication of Consumers Glass
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