The first plastic-eating bacteria known to science has been discovered by a team of Japanese researchers, potentially paving the way for its use in industrial recycling and the cleaning-up of pollution.

One of the most common plastics in the world – polyethylene terephthalate (PET) – can have its molecular bonds broken by the bacteria in as little as six weeks, as the bacteria actually uses the plastic as a food source.

Incredibly, the bacteria appears to have evolved enzymes specifically to enable it to break down plastic as a result of the massive amounts which are now ever-present in the environment.

Professor of microbiology at Swinburne University, Enzo Palombo, believes this to be the case. He said: “If you put a bacteria in a situation where they’ve only got one food source to consume, over time they will adapt to do that.”

Annually, around 33% of all plastics end up in either soil or waterways across the globe, causing huge damage to the environment.

Here at TrakRap, whilst we naturally think that this is fantastic news for everyone, it is equally important that we put measures in place in order to keep dumped plastics out of our environment in the first place. As everybody knows, prevention is better than cure.

Good news after the recent story regarding water shortages, as the construction of the world’s biggest floating solar farm is due for completion in a matter of days. Built on a manmade lake just outside of London, the farm will be used to generate power for local water treatment plants for years to come.

The farm features 23,000 solar panels and will be floated on the Queen Elizabeth II reservoir near Heathrow - causing no harm to the ecosystem in the process. 

Owned by Thames Water, the farm will cost £6million and has been in development for five years. Lightsource Renewable Energy is responsible for its development, and it can contain 6.3MW of energy – equivalent to the electricity consumption of approximately 1,800 homes.

Thames Water’s energy manager, Angus Berry, said, “This will be the biggest floating solar farm in the world for a time – others are under construction. We are leading the way, but we hope that others will follow, in the UK and abroad.”

A smaller farm is currently under construction on a reservoir near Manchester, and an even bigger farm will be completed on a reservoir in Japan in 2018.

Here at TrakRap, we’re always on the lookout for energy efficient solutions to larger problems and we think that this is a particularly good example. Not only will the floating solar farm generate clean energy, it will also benefit London’s water supply and the millions who rely on it.

Thousands of landfill dumps in the UK may begin to leak dangerous substances into streets, beaches and rivers as a result of coastal erosion, flooding and a historical lack of regulations, according to new research.

Analysis of ageing landfill dumps in the UK shows that 2,946 are located in flood plains, with 1,655 of these containing dangerous materials, including asbestos. Ageing dumps are particularly at risk as they pre-date EU waste regulations which state that they must include a protective lining to protect waste from severe weather.

The storms which ravaged the UK this winter have shown that even sturdy weather-defence systems can be breached by sustained rainfall. In 2015, extreme weather damaged the walls of a dump in Dublin and exposed hundreds of metres of rubbish, including rusted metal and heavy plastics, to the elements.

With climate change set to increase the frequency of floods and storm surges across the UK, sites will become even more vulnerable, increasing the risk to people and marine wildlife.

Friends of the Earth Campaigner, Guy Shrubsole, said: “The research is alarming. Britain’s leaky landfills could turn out to be a toxic timebomb.”

At TrakRap, whilst we’re longstanding advocates of recycling and environmentally friendly practices, we appreciate that landfill sites remain a necessity. However, we would call on the government to reinforce the UK’s ageing dumps in order to prevent further environmental damage.

Sobering news this week, as new research shows that four billion people globally face severe water scarcity for at least one month a year.

Water shortages affect two thirds of the world’s population, with 500 million people living in places where water consumption is double the amount replenished by rain. China and India are the two countries most in danger but Australia and central and western America are also under threat.

Professor Arjen Hoekstra, from the University of Twente team which led the research, was quick to point out that the UK can’t afford to relax either, saying, “(London doesn’t) have the water in the surrounding area to sustain the water flows” to it in the long term.

Separately, as population growth continues, so farming rates have to increase in order to meet demands for food – unfortunately, the farming industry is the biggest consumer of water. 25% of a person’s water footprint comes from meat consumption, as 15,000 litres of water is required in order to produce 1kg of beef.

“Caps on water use should be put in place, and companies should be transparent about how much water is needed to make their products and look to reduce it”, added Prof Hoekstra.

Water plays an important role in the manufacturing process. At TrakRap, we’ve already reduced the amounts of energy and materials we use - we also make every effort to ensure we are water efficient too.

A potentially game-changing development in the world of automation has been reported this week, as a Japanese company has announced that it is to open the world’s first robot-run farm, in an attempt to curb the country’s labour shortage.

Spread, a vegetable producer based in Kameoka, announced that, from 2017, all but one of the tasks necessary to grow the tens of thousands of lettuces it produces every day at its indoor farm will be carried out by industrial robots.

Apart from planting the initial seeds, everything, from watering to harvesting the crops, will be done by robots. This, claims Spread, will allow the business to increase production from 21,000 to 50,000 lettuces daily, whilst also increasing efficiency, reducing labour and energy costs, and allowing for 98% of the water used to be recycled.

“Our new farm could become a model for other farms, but our aim is not to replace human farmers, but to develop a system where humans and machines work together,” said Spread’s global marketing manager, JJ Price. “We want to generate interest in farming, particularly among young people.”

Using new technologies to increase energy efficiency and production rates, without increasing human unemployment, represents the holy-grail for environmentally friendly, technologically savvy companies. This development might just prove to be the breakthrough and template that many other organisations have been waiting for.

With changes to our shopping habits and the rise of discount retailers having made headlines recently, perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised that easyJet founder, Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou, has applied his no-frills approach to the grocery trade with the opening of his first easyFoodstore.

Throughout February, everything on sale in easyFoodstore will cost a mere 25p, making it even cheaper than established budget-supermarkets Aldi and Lidl. And with the pilot store in north-west London selling out of all its stock within two days of opening, there is clearly a market for hyper low-budget retailers. But what does this mean for the associated packaging companies?

Because discount retailers tend to be frequented by consumers shopping ‘little and often’, and because the available space on the shelves and in storage areas of convenience stores is often much smaller than in large supermarkets, changes to pack sizes and designs becomes vital. 

Similarly, packaging which is easier and quicker to open is of paramount importance, as the speed with which stock can be replenished must be increased in order to maximise profitability. With a larger range of designs also becoming necessary, the result is that packaging costs are invariably driven up.

At TrakRap, we approve of developments that make everyday items more affordable, however it is absolutely vital that low cost retailers ensure sustainability remains a priority for everyone involved throughout the supply chain.

Incentives to boost the number of electric cars on the UK’s roads were announced by the Department for Transport earlier this week, in an attempt to encourage a greater uptake of the green vehicles.

Eight cities – London, York, Bristol, Milton Keynes, Nottingham, Oxford, Derby and Dundee – have been awarded funding and will share a £40m kitty between them. The cities all have different plans for the funds, with Milton Keynes and Derby to permit the use of electric cars in bus lanes, Bristol offering free parking and York installing new recharge points at a solar-powered park-and-ride facility.

The new policy will also help to reduce the UK’s currently-illegal levels of nitrogen dioxide pollution and to meet carbon budgets. A similar scheme, whereby the government subsidised £5,000 of every electric car purchased, was launched in 2011 and has proven very successful.

Transport secretary, Patrick McLoughlin, said: “I want to see thousands more greener vehicles on our roads and I am proud to back this ambition with £40m to help the UK become international pioneers of emission-cutting technology.”

At TrakRap, we fully support incentives which highlight the importance of sustainability in the UK. Positioning the country at the forefront of the electric car revolution is a great step to take as it sends out the message that we are fully committed to improving air quality and planning for the future.

After the recent story regarding Drax power station switching from coal to biofuel, we thought we’d take a look further afield at the practical benefits that sustainable energy production on a large scale has brought to parts of Scandinavia.

Denmark has revealed its wind power figures for 2015 and they make for fantastic reading – the above-average amount of wind last year helped Denmark to produce a world record 42% of its electricity from wind turbines.

On one occasion in September, the country was able to operate without needing to switch on a single central power station and, in July, Denmark produced so much electricity that it was able to meet all its electricity needs and export another 40% overseas!

Needless to say, the Danes are on course to meet their 2050 target of producing half of all their electricity courtesy of wind.

Chief policy officer of the European Wind Energy Association (EWEA), Kristian Ruby, said: “These figures show that we are now at a level where wind integration can be the backbone of electricity systems in advanced economies.”

Here at TrakRap, we’d like to applaud the Danes’ continued implementation of sustainable energy production. Their incredible success proves that an environmentally-friendly approach will deliver positive results, benefiting the country and the rest of the planet, and raising the bar for everybody else.

In the ongoing battle with climate change, trees are a natural first line of defence as they help to reduce the amount of greenhouse gases that are present in the atmosphere. Unfortunately, there simply aren’t enough of them to cope with the quantity of greenhouse gases, and, at present, too few trees are being planted to make up the deficit. 

Happily, some interesting news from the US has reached us this week, as it has been revealed that two designers in Boston have been recruited to develop artificial trees capable of absorbing carbon dioxide, before either storing it or converting it into fuel. 

A spokesperson for the Center for Negative Carbon Emissions in Arizona claims that one square kilometre of artificial trees could theoretically remove four million tons of carbon from the atmosphere annually. 

There is a downside, however – the artificial trees don’t resemble real ones, as developers prioritise the efficiency of the carbon-removal process over realism. Affordability is also an issue, but once the technology has been perfected, its designers estimate that the cost of removing carbon dioxide will be as little as $100 a tonne.

Pioneering new technologies that challenge the norm and that are designed to lessen our impact on the environment is exactly what we deliver here at TrakRap.

Drax power station in North Yorkshire is the biggest in Britain and, historically, one of its biggest polluters. However, the gargantuan site has now switched from burning coal to burning low-grade wood pellets sourced from working forests in an attempt to reduce its carbon footprint.

Although converting a power plant from coal to biomass has never been done on this scale before, two of Drax’s six units have already been completed, and a third will be burning 100% wood before the end of the year, at a total cost of £700m and with an estimated carbon saving of more than 80%. Additionally, the two biomass-burning units at Drax already generate approximately 12% of the UK’s total renewable-electricity.

According to Drax Group’s chief executive, Dorothy Thompson, it is a switch the company has been keen to implement for some time. She said: “We used to be the biggest carbon emitter in the UK, which we were not comfortable with. (But) at the time, it was simply thought not possible to burn biomass in a unit of any size that had been used to burn coal.”

Here at TrakRap, we think that this represents an excellent example of an evolution in energy creation, and a very encouraging start to 2016. Drax used to burn around 30,000 tonnes of coal a day; today it uses about seven million tons of biomass waste a year.