1. Click to edit Master title style
A STEM and enterprise challenge to turn waste plastics into profit 1

2. What Do you SEE?
Spend a few minutes looking at the photographs and in your groups discuss the following questions:
What do you see?
What does it make you think about?
Are there any problems that you can identify?
To be used in conjunction with the Pupil sheet Starter Activity What do you see?
And finally…
What questions do the photographs raise for you?

3. RUBBISH FACTS… IN THE UK
The average household produces more than a tonne of waste every year
We produce 5 million tonnes of plastic waste every year
Some plastic can take up to 500 years to decompose
75% of plastic waste ends up in landfill
The website has great facts about plastic waste in the UK.
…but waste is a not just an issue in the UK 3

4. Kathmandu - Nepal
In Kathmandu, the capital of Nepal, waste is a big issue too.
Private companies collect waste from homes but not everyone can afford to pay for the service. Those who can’t have the option of taking their waste to selected areas within the city or leaving it out on the streets.
Informal street collection and waste areas provide opportunities for up to 15,000 people, including children, to make a living from waste.
Many of the pictures that the pupils have looked at, including those above are from Kathmandu in Nepal.

5. Sayeed and Sunil
One of the first opportunities to make money is to sort waste into different material types and sell it on to scrap dealers for reuse or recycling.
Sayeed and Sunil aged 13 and 15 collect waste, including plastics and metals, from the streets of Kathmandu to sell on to scrap dealers.
Sorting through mixed materials is a dangerous job. One simple way the boys keep safe is to wear protective clothing provided by Practical Action in Nepal.
Practical Action in Nepal has worked with the waste collectors and their families for the past 10 years to secure funding to provide access to safe clothing, improved technologies for processing the waste and access to schooling for the children involved in waste collection.

6. IDENTIFYING plastics Activity:
Look through your bag of waste plastics and decide as a group the best way to sort them.
Think about what might generate the most income for you if you took them to a plastic dealer for reuse or recycling.
Your teacher may now give you some investigation activities so that you can identify and sort your plastics into different types.
Different plastics have different symbols which tell us the polymers they are made from and whether they can be recycled.
At the sorting plants, plastics tend to get sorted by the polymers they are made from as it gives the biggest financial return and range of potential uses for this material after recycling.
This slide links to the Identifying plastics activity.

7. waste TIMELINE Activity You have given been eight picture cards.
Place them in a timeline on your desk, from the fastest to the slowest item to decompose.
Slide 7-9 link to the Waste timeline activity.
2014
3014

8. Check your timeline Did you get them in the right order?
Fastest to decompose
Slowest to decompose
Did you get them in the right order?
How long do you think it would take each item to decompose on a landfill site?

9. Time to Decompose TEA bag Woolen sock Banana Skin Apple core
1 year
TEA bag
1 month
Banana Skin
6 weeks
Apple core
2 months
2 months
4 months
6 months
8 months
10 months
12 months
Plastic bag
20 years
Mobile phone
1000 years
Plastic bottle
450 years
Magazines
50 years
200 years
400 years
600 years
800 years
1000 years

10. Life story of a plastic bottle
A life cycle analysis (LCA) is used to work out the environmental impact of a product throughout its whole life.
Why might a designer, engineer or scientist be interested in the LCA of a plastic bottle?
Pupils have the chance to carry out a LCA of a plastic bottle and use the 4Rs to identify ways to reduce the environmental impact of the product.

11. ? ? 4Rs The 4Rs (Rethink, Reduce, Reuse and Recycle)
can be used to develop ideas to reduce the negative impact a product has on the environment.
What ideas do you have to make plastic better for people and the environment? ? ?
This activity can be extended by using the Plastics challenge poster to add ideas onto that accompanies the challenge.

12. Your PLASTICs challenge
…is to develop a solution to tackle the environmental problems caused by plastic waste either in Nepal or the UK.
One option is to explore reusing waste plastic for enterprise…turning plastics into profit. UK
Nepal
You may want to choose to present the Nepal or UK Design contexts or allow the pupils to choose. The following three slides show the specific contexts as described on the Pupil sheet Design contexts.

13. Plastics into profit Nepal
The Hamro Mahila Women’s Group in Nepal was set up after a group of women were trained and supported by Practical Action in making crafts from ‘waste’ plastic. Their enterprise allows them to work in a safer environment whilst earning money.
Your challenge is to design a product that could be made by the women’s group from locally found waste plastic. The women have the use of a sewing machine, iron and basic craft tools. The products need to be made cheaply and safe to use.
At the moment they make pencil cases, coasters and baskets, but are looking to expand their range of products.
 For more information

14. PLASTICS INTO PROFIT UK YOUNG ENTERPRISE
Your newly set-up young enterprise company have decided to take on ‘The Fiver Challenge’ which aims to create a mini business idea with a start-up fund of £5.
It is up to you what you use the £5 for but your product must:
reuse locally sourced plastic
engage with the community either in the creation of the product or its final use
You will need to consider your target market and your product branding.
Details of this context are available on the Pupil sheet Design contexts.

15. PLASTICS INTO PROFIT UK CHARITY
The charity Practical Action are looking to broaden awareness of the work they do, so want you to design a product that could be sold online at Practical Presents practicalpresents.org
They would like the product:
to have a strong sustainability message so would like you to use plastic ‘waste’ that is easily available
should be cheap to make but safe to use and have a high quality finish.
More detail about this project is available for pupils on the Design Context sheet.

16. What next?
If you have taken part in the plastics challenge you could enter your project to gain a CREST award
Discovery Award – for a Discovery award you would need to record what you have on a CREST passport.
Bronze – Gold Awards – you can use the challenge as a starting point for a project of your own.
More details can be found at:
GOOD LUCK!
Details of the competition are available on the last page of the Plastics Challenge teacher’s notes.

17. Click to edit Master title style
WE HOPE YOU HAVE ENJOYED THE PLASTICS CHALLENGE…
To find out more about Practical Action’s other STEM challenges go to practicalaction.org/stem
To change the colour of the slide click Format/Slide design and choose from the options in the task pane on the right
A selection of pictures that will fit into this space are available here
practicalaction.org/plastics-challenge 17