I have blogged for years on the problems facing the labels industry in managing its waste streams, and to a large degree most of the problems are  still here, but getting closer to a solution. This is a summary of the options as far as I know:

The labelling industry produces millions of m2 of siliconised label waste like this a year - and we cannt work out a way of reusing it.

Siliconised glassine paper release liner (“backing paper”) – this cannt be recycled with normal paper as you need a sophisticated deinking plant to remove the silicone.  Consequently the options are limited to landfill, waste to energy or recycling (which is often uneconomic at current rates).

Major recyclers of siliconised glassine release liners include:

• Chanelled resources – who ship the paper for reuse overseas
• Cycle for green - recycling by reprocessing at Lenzing Papier in Austria at a specialist plant
• UPM papers- recycling in France via  Vertaris by reprocessing 

To my knowledge there are no UK recyclers of glassine liner, and only 2 plants in Europe (France and Austria) that can reproceses it.

Siliconised PET (polyester) release liner - this cannt be recycled with normal PET.  Consequently the options are limited to landfill, waste to energy or specialist recycling

Major recyclers of siliconised PET release liners include

• Avery Dennison (as previously reported here)

Siliconised PP (polypropylene) release liner - this is a new and emerging release liner solution that can sometimes be recycled with other PP plastic waste provided that it is properly segregated.  Consequently the options are limited to landfill, waste to energy or specialist recycling

Major recyclers of siliconised PP release liners include

• UPM

Matrix Waste

This is the biggest unaddressed problem.  Mercian Labels commissionsed a report from a leading European academic specialising in waste management in 2008, which recommended that the only viable options were landfill (undesirable but cost effective), or waste to energy, which is the position we are trying to move to.  This is because its a mix of paper, plastic, adhesive, ink and silicone that cannt be separated into different waste streams.  I have blogged on this subject before here and here , and the position remains largely unchanged.  From our perspective, we are waiting for a waste to energy plant to be built near one of our operations in Cannock as our long term solution.

If you generate batches of more than  3 tonnes of liner then you can get it recycled through one of the routes described above.  If you are a smaller user, and most people will be, then I am afraid that to our knowledge there are no other recycling options available at the moment in the UK.

Help for Heroes

Tomorrow I am running the Lichfield Half Marathon in aid of Help for Heroes. Mercian Labels has supported Help for Heroes before, and I’m pleased to be running tomorrow and sweating it out for a couple of ours to support such a worthy cause.

I dont enjoy running, didnt enjoy the training, and its going to be a hot and long 2.5 hours for me, but compared to what today’s injured servicemen and women go through on their return from action its a walk in the park.

If you are a regular reader of this blog please could I ask you to make a donation via our “Just Giving” site – just think of it as part of your contribution to the Military Covenant. There are few more worthy causes in Great Britain today.

Thank you.

germinating the 2011 chilli crop in moist boxes, ready for 2 weeks in the airing cupboard

For new followers of this blog, its a tradition that I grow chillies for summer bbqs and hot winter curries when I’m not doing labelling!  You can see previous years crops here and here, and my inspiration from Alan at The Open Sourcerer blog here.

30 of the 80 potted seedings of the hot thai variety growing nicely

Last week I potted out the 80 seedlings ready for a bumper harvest of chillies this summer.  There is some friendly banter with other labelling companies on Twitter who fancy themselves as growers tot – does anybody else who reads this blog grow anything interesting?

@mercianlabels new twitter background using a Powerpoint presentation template

I’m quite pleased with our new custom background for the @MercianLabels Twitter account.  Its designed using a free and easy template that we are releasing with this blog post in both Powerpoint  and Open Office Presentation formats.

There are other ways of doing custom Twitter templates, even free templates using Powerpoint type files, but none that I could find for the “new twitter” format. The twitter background template I’ve designed is optimised for the new twitter, like this.

So, if you want to design your own custom twitter background, they are here to download in both Powerpoint and Open source ODP formats.

My final Mo' after 1 month of growth - not quite Tom Selleck though...

Since starting to grow a tache for Movember I’ve realised what an irritating feature facial hair is, at least for me.  Well, its the last day and after a joint photo with my local Round Table this evening its coming off, thankfully!

If you havent read up on Movember, the awareness campaign for prostate cancer then you can do so here.  Or, if you wish to make a donation to the Movember charity for my month of itchy hardship you can do so here.

screenshot of the windows 7 eula - no refund here!

I had a coffee spill over my laptop yesterday which killed my 5 year old HP nx6125 laptop, so I ordered a new one and it arrived today.  Its a HP Compaq Presario CQ61 for about £280+vat, cheap and cheerful as these things so, but as always came bundled with Microsoft Windows.  I tried to buy a naked computer with no OS, but it was substantialy more expensive.  I therefore took advantage of the windows subsidy of loads of  bundled software and bought it, immediately overwriting the windows instalation before use with Ubuntu 10.10.  It took less keyboard time to install Ubuntu that it took to write this post!  ubuntu 10.10 works perfectly, first time, no hassle, and I’m writing this post on it now.

Unfortunately the new windows 7 EULA dosnt permit refunds, which is a shame so I wont try to get a refund on the windows tax this time, but there you go.

Ubuntu 10.10 is excellent!

The role of Graphic Designer is to assess and prep electronic design files for digital pre-press work and the production of printing plates, ensuring maximum continuity, the highest quality and efficiency of operation.

100% desk based.

Detailed responsibilities

* To reconcile all electronic design files with customers expectations, and press production
* To be responsible for accurate and timely issue and chasing of artwork approvals to our
customers
* To be responsible for accurate and timely issue of works orders to our print team
* To submit timely design file to plate makers every day
* To solve problems by liasing with customers and suppliers as required
* To resolve all internal and external design queries.
* To support the Sales Team with technical queries when required
* Other tasks to support the business plan as and when required

For full details, please view the full job description

To apply please email (preferred) or post your CV to the Sales Team Leader – Elaine Jefferson at elaine.jefferson@mercianlabels.com as soon as possible. Informal discussions by phone are welcome on 01543 431 079.

first chilli crop of 2010

The fist chill cropping of 2010 was on Saturday, now all safely picked away in jars ready for the winter curries. Lots to come from the initial plants!

This came with Microsoft Windows Vista pre-loaded, but being the Open Source advocates we are here at Mercian Labels, I bought this laptop with the mind to install Ubuntu 10.04 right away.

Whilst installing Ubuntu 10.04 was easy, a few issues arose with getting the wireless working with the chipset, but thats another story; but after installing Ubuntu, I decided to try my luck at getting a refund from Dell for Windows.

I had read previous articles outlining a few steps in order to try and get a refund on Windows, so this is what I did.

Even though I purchases this through one of Amazon’s third party sellers, I thought it was best to contact them first.

I went through the process of contacting customer services (Amazon > Help, Click How do I contact customer service?, Login, Click E-Mail and then Put in order number, then select Issue: Return and Refunds, and then I sent the following email:

SENT On: 28/07/2010 10:30am

To Whom this may concern.

I recently purchased a Dell laptop from yourselves, order number ############.

I do not agree to the terms of the Dell Software Licensing Agreement or the Microsoft Windows End User License Agreement.

I confirm that I have not used any of the software on the laptop, nor booted the laptop up into Windows, and have deleted all preloaded or embedded software from my Dell Laptop.

How will you refund the cost of the Microsoft Windows Vista software? I note that Windows Vista Home Premium retails at £151.95, which means a total refund of £151.95 is due.

Kind Regards
Rich

Within 19 minutes of sending the email, I got a response from Amazon, which was prompt, stating:

Response: 10:49 28/07/2010
Dear Customer

Thank you for contacting Amazon.co.uk.

After looking into your enquiry, I can see that you have placed this order ############## with one of our registered third party seller “######”.

I am sorry to learn that you are not happy with the license agreement. In a case like this, we do ask that you first contact the seller to explain the situation and to make appropriate arrangements.

To contact your seller just click the Your Account link on the top right of Amazon.co.uk, and click the Your Orders button. Next select the order from the options Orders Listed by Date.

Then locate the relevant order number on the left of the screen. You will also see an image of the item(s) in your order so as to identify it correctly.

Once located, look for the yellow button to the right of your screen reading Contact Seller.

For more information on communicating with Marketplace sellers, you can visit this link:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=3149541

I hope that this issue will be resolved to your satisfaction

Thank you for your understanding and for shopping at Amazon.co.uk Marketplace.

I have sent the exact same email I originally sent to Amazon, to the third party seller, and will update this post as and when I receive any response.

getting ready for the off!

Cpt Ed Pawsey of the 2nd Battalion, the Yorkshire Regiment recently contacted us in their bid to raise money for Help for Heroes , the charity that helps to support wounded UK service men and women.  Ed and his colleagues are doing the Help for Heroes European Rally and have had some good local publicity.  This is what they say on their website

Team Green Howard has secured a place on the Help for Heroes European Rally 2010.  This rally as you may have read consists of a monster 1650 mile drive starting on Salisbury Plain crossing Normandy and ending at Hitler’s ‘Eagles Nest’ in Berchtesgaden, Austria whilst traversing 6 countries.  This rally follows the route of the well known TV series ‘Band of Brothers’ and is part road/off road competition whilst visiting specific historical locations.  All in order to raise funds for the Help for Heroes charity.

The Team consists of Ed Pawsey, Will Pawsey and James Kelly.  Both Ed and James are Captains in the Army.  Ed’s in the 2nd Battalion the Yorkshire Regiment (the Green Howards).  James is a Captain in the Royal Engineers and is a Bomb Disposal Officer.  Will is a student studying Criminology at Nottingham University and is set to join the Poice Force.  All three of us have close links to friends who have been injured or killed in Afghanistan and make this trip and raise funds in memory of them. Help for Heroes is at the front of our mind for obvious reasons and without this charity and your generous donations our many injured service men and women would not have the lengthy process of rehabilitation your fundraising has begun to provide.  Without this rehabilitation it would be near impossible to give these Heroes the ability to rebuild their lives and face a positive future.

Please give what you can as every little helps.  ALL money raised goes to the charity and not funding the event or team.  It may take 5 minutes to register but 5 minutes now is a future better for all.

Ed is asking for any donations on his Just Giving website, so please contribute anything you can to this very worth cause.

Chilli plant update

As I’ve been blogging here and here, I’ve been on a bit of a chilli growing mission this year after last years startup effort.  Here is the current state of play, and I think I’ll get about 150-200 chillis out of this lot which will make some excellent christmas presents once picked or dried, plus some curries for my family.  There is mix of hot and mild varieties, and I’m happy to share if anyone wants some!

We hope to attend the Ubuntu in Business Event on 13 July in London to meet up with other Ubuntu Business users, and would like to hear from anyone else who is going too!  Register here – see you there.  We may speak at the event if given a chance, so would welcome any comments on what you’d like to hear about from a SME who has migrated its business to open source linux software.

We use a lot of SNOM 300 VOIP phones at our sites, and have just cracked a way to make conference calls on them, which is not obvious or covered by the manual. If you are trying to do this:

1. Login to your phone using the web GUI via http://its.IP.x.x and select function L4 – directory, (or any function you dont use)
2. change the function tag to   F_CONFERENCE
3. save

to make a conference call,

1. call the first call, speak and put on hold by pressing the L1 line 1 button
2. dial the second number and speak to them
3. press L4 and all 3 callers are connected

I really enjoyed my day at OGGCamp in Liverpool on Saturday.  The variety of freedom of thought from the attendees was quite refreshing.  From ANPR camera monitoring and embedded linux in in car entertainment systems through to the role of women in open source culture and home automation it was a great event.

Thanks to all who organised the event, including Josh who came to work for us last summer on an open source work experience project.  Josh has got a place to read Mathematics at Oxford University I found out too – well done Josh!

all re-potted last weekend and coming on at a pace!

chilli plant update - early incubation in the airing cupboard has got these off to a flying start

I’ve picked up on the open source community interest in Chilli plant growing from Alan at the Open Sourcer, and previously blogged on last years Chilli crop, and the new batch for 2010.  Growing progress is good – this is the state of this years crop.  Good curries coming next winter!

dell mini 9 running ubuntu netbook remix

I’ve had problems recently connecting my Dell mini 9 using ubuntu netbook remix to a t-mobile  3G modem over bluetooth as previously blogged, which I think is related to this ubuntu bluetooth bug.  I had some time yesterday and set about finding a fix to this problem to enable me to get web access on the netbook anywhere I have my phone and a 3G cable.

The solution was to connect the phone to the netbook using a normal USB cable and select “PC suite transfer” on the nokia e90.  Then setup a new “mobile broadband” connection under system>network connections>mobile broadband, in my case t-mobile UK.  Then unplug and replug in the usb cable and the new t-mobile connection appears in the network connections icon in the top right of the page.  Click and it just connects.