SubscribeBaling and compaction solutions from Orwak achieve much more than preparing waste material, primarily cardboard and plastic packaging, for recycling or disposal like incineration or landfill.
To illustrate this, let's take a look at four typical market segments - food retail, non-food retail, hotels and restaurants, and industry - to see what additional benefits are gained by waste handling at source. Then you'll understand why Orwak's new slogan is "Making sure less is more".
As you would expect, certain benefits of waste compaction are common to all four of the market segments in question. Three of these are given below.
Versatile compaction: - the vast range of products produced, supplied to or sold by all market segments produce a huge mountain of waste that must be constantly and rapidly removed. The robust construction of Orwak balers allows them to effectively compact a diverse range of materials such as cardboard boxes, paper packaging, bags of general waste, plastic film and bags, steel and plastic bands, glass and tins, and light wooden crates. Sorting of waste at source is facilitated by multichamber balers to produce compact waste for recycling or disposal. Both dry solid material and semi-wet organic waste can be handled.
Keeping spaces clear: - balers and compactors rapidly minimize the volume of waste material to help keep aisles, passageways and other areas clean and free of clutter, thereby promoting unhindered and rapid movement around the workplace. More over, high-density waste requires much less storage space than piles of loose waste, and the small footprint of all Orwak systems ensures that they take up little floorspace.
Generating and saving money: - highly compacted waste means fewer container pickups, and sorting at source yields a higher quality of waste material for recycling that is readily accepted. Sorting also leads to less waste for disposal, thus reducing disposal fees. Generating and saving money in this way leads to rapid payback of an Orwak system and achieving the best total waste handling economy.
Concentrating on the job
One benefit demanded particularly by both the non-food retail and industrial segments is minimal waste handling. The high-density waste produced at source and the consequent reduction in internal transport result in less waste handling in the workplace compared with that needed to remove widespread loose waste.
Thus sales personnel have more time to concentrate on core activities like responding to customer enquiries, and production workers are able to focus more on their jobs to increase productivity.
Distributed and central waste handling
In many cases, hotels and restaurants, as well as industry have a need for local and/or central waste compaction. In larger hotels, local distribution usually entails placement of a baler or compactor on each floor that facilitates the handling and removal of waste from hotel rooms, rest rooms and conference facilities.
In industrial premises, local distribution means placing a compactor next to a number of production line machines to take care of waste handling at source. In addition, central waste compaction may be an alternative or complementary solution in both market segments.
Enhanced security
Both large and small companies have a responsibility to provide a safe environment for staff and implement measures to prevent goods from being stolen or tampered with. Companies that produce or sell high-value goods are more likely to be found in the non-food retail and industrial market segments.
Compaction and baling contribute to providing a more secure environment for employees and preventing theft in the workplace. Volume reduction helps to:
- Produce compact waste that cannot be used to hide stolen goods.
- Prevent illegal entry by minimizing the opening of outer doors.
- Facilitate the overnight storage of waste inside thus avoiding the dangers of darkness to staff.
As damaged property, stolen goods and personal injury threaten good economy, Orwak waste handling solutions also help to maintain financial security.
Matching capacity and material flow
Food retailers, hotels and restaurants have a similar problem that must be solved daily - uneven waste material flow. With food retailers, products are usually unpacked early each morning to fill up vacant shelf and display space ready for a new stream of customers. With hotels and restaurants it is slightly different.
Here, The flow of waste is determined by such activities as mealtimes - breakfast, lunch and dinner - bar service, and guests leaving in the morning. Nevertheless, in both cases the uneven daily material flow is a key factor to consider when carrying out a waste-handling audit.
The range of capacities offered by Orwak systems not only takes care of the waste volumes generated by food retailers, hotels and restaurants of different size, but also the uneven flow of waste material during the day.
Safe, easy-to-use systems
Within industry, a compaction system is usually operated by just one person trained to take care of the unit. This is in contrast to both food and non-food retailers. Here, several staff members constantly fill shelves and many outside suppliers visit food retailers regularly to restock their own display units, all of whom take their waste to the installed baler and fill it.
Therefore a baler must be very easy to operate to allow different people to use it without difficulty.
An important feature of all Orwak waste handling systems is that they are very safe and easy to operate. Thus both retailer staff and external suppliers become quickly familiar with using a baler and can rely on its smooth running and safety.
Promoting good hygiene
Food retailers, hotels and restaurants must maintain a high standard of hygiene. Solid waste material that has not been taken care of correctly is a potential health hazard. Semi-wet organic waste degrades quickly and becomes offensive, and both residual food and accumulated waste attract animals.
Keeping work areas free from mess is important to promoting better hygiene. Orwak waste compaction solutions play an important role in this by:
- Preventing pest infestation by producing highly compact bales.
- Enabling bagged waste to be stored inside buildings thus stopping it from being ripped open by animals.
- Compacted waste that minimizes the release of unhealthy airborne particles.
- Sealed bags that prevents the release of unpleasant odors.
- Machines that are easy to clean and maintain.
Cutting risk at work
Of the four typical market segments selected, industry presents the greater potential for risks in the workplace because of, e.g. internal transport, moving machine parts, welding equipment and other sources of naked flame, and the constant flow of people and material. In this situation, waste management is a necessary part of risk management.
Compaction helps to minimize risks by reducing the possibility of fire through removing combustible loose waste, keeping floors free from waste materials that might cause a person to slip, trip or fall, and cutting forklift use and the associated potential for injury.
Less is more
We need to look beyond waste volume reduction to see the accumulated added value that results from correct solid waste handling at source. As can be seen from the above, compaction doesn't just produce less volume of waste, it yields a number of other reductions like less transport, less disposal, less handling, less clutter, less risk, less mess, etc., that yield a corresponding number of financial and other benefits.
And each particular market segment can profit in several ways from baling and compaction systems developed, manufactured and supplied by Orwak, who is dedicated to "making sure less is more".