Salon sweepings, shucked shells star in best green schemes

Twenty-nine??? NGOs, councils, community groups and businesses are among the finalists in the 2017 Premier's Sustainability Awards, with winners in 10 categories to be announced on Thursday.

Among the finalists is one of last year's winners, the TIC group, which is up for another award for mattress recycling.

"The bottom line is that mattresses are so big and bulky that they take up massive amounts of space in landfill," says Steve Maizels, operations manager at the group's Altona recycling plant.

"And they don't compress or break down."

Unlike what he calls "cowboy" operators who strip the covers off old mattresses and try to resell them, Mr Maizels says TIC breaks them down and resells 80 per cent.

The textile covering material and foam is stripped and sold to carpeting companies for underlay, while the springs are shredded and sold as scrap metal.

The recycling of the grey blanket-like material that makes up about 20 per cent of the mattress volume isn't commercially viable in Victoria, Mr Maizels said.

Instead, TIC shreds that and sends it to landfill, significantly reducing the space it takes up.

"We process 500 mattresses a day, just in Melbourne," Mr Maizels said.

Sustainable Salons Australia aims to recycle up to 95 per cent of the waste produced by hairdressers and beauty salons by repurposing old razors, chemicals and even hair clippings.

Co-founder Paul Frasca says the clippings were used for compost but could soon revolutionise the way maritime oil spills are cleaned up.

He says oil booms are currently used to clean spills but the "hair booms" Sustainable Salons Australia is developing could also remove much of the oil from the water.

"Each boom we make absorbs four litres of crude oil and we can squeeze three litres out of them. So they act like sponges on the oil."

The company is funding research into the development of the hair booms, which it hopes to have commercialised and sold to ports across Australia within the next 12 months.

That research has repurposed about 30,000 kilograms of hair clippings, Mr Frasca says, but a second project will soon convert more than three times that amount into soil and, eventually, food crops.

"Next year we are looking to do the largest hair composting project in the world," Mr Frasca says.

"Hair is 50 per cent carbon and holds huge amounts of amino acids and protein, which all make for really good compost."

Another finalist in the awards is being recognised for its work to redress the environmental devastation unleashed in Melbourne's early days.

The Nature Conservancy marine restoration co-ordinator, Simon Branigan, says his organisation's Shuck Don't Chuck Recycling Project is using oyster shells from restaurants to restore the lost shellfish reefs of Port Phillip Bay.

"Up to 50 per cent of the sea floor was once dominated by shellfish reefs, oyster and mussel reefs," Mr Branigan says.

"Our long-term project is focused on restoring those reefs."

The project has had some early successes and restored 600 square metres of reefs at Hobsons and Corio bays using the recycled shells and limestone rubble.

"Globally, 85 per cent of shellfish reefs have been lost - in southern Australia that figure is closer to 99 per cent," Mr Branigan says.

"They are what is technically called an ecologically collapsed ecosystem.

"There are still wild, native oysters and mussels in the bay, but they are no longer forming a reef-type habitat."

Mr Branigan hopes the project marks a turning point for the reefs. Over the next six months the aim is to build another 1000 square metres of reef and, by 2021, another 20 hectares.

Working with just three restaurants in greater Geelong and one main wholesaler, the group had recycled more than 400 cubic metres of shells.

"We've only scratched the surface of the number of shells we can recycle," Mr Branigan says.

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