Business in Colour podcast

UNSW SMaRT Centre Director, Professor Veena Sahajwalla was interviewed by the "Business in Colour" podcast series about how the UNSW SMaRT Centre recycling technologies derive value from waste.

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Business In Colour is a podcast that inspires, empowers and mobilizes leaders and allies to understand and act for greater diversity. Hear our stories so that you understand our journey, our experiences and our wants. We bring to you leaders who are doing incredible work in this space. We know this work is not easy, we know the challenges leaders face. Our hope is that by listening to the leaders on the Business In Colour podcast, you make a commitment to act for positive change.

The bazaars of Mumbai taught a young Veena Sahajwalla that there is value in trash. Veena was the NSW Australian of the Year 2022...and in her acceptance speech she acknowledged those who traded in the bazaars of Mumbai....

"The award was a recognition that waste as a material, if it's valued, could have big positive consequences. We wouldn't throw it away, we would re-manufacture things, we'd pay fair wages to people."

She invented Green Steel which she describes as the "holy grail" formula by using coffee waste instead of coking coal.

Veena is an internationally recognised materials scientist, engineer and innovator who is revolutionising recycling science. She is renowned for pioneering the high temperature transformation of waste in the production of a new generation of ‘green materials’. As Director of the Sustainable Materials Research and Technology Centre at UNSW, she has built a world-class research hub. Sahajwalla leads a highly innovative research program that fosters innovation and promotes collaboration with industry to ensure that scientific advances in sustainable materials and processes are readily translated into commercially-viable environmental solution.