The Hindu Business Line : Use and… reuse

Growing up in Mumbai, Prof Veena Sahajwalla didn’t think of anything as waste. “In India, we used and recycled just about everything.” Values ingrained at an early age have paid off as she recently received the four-year Australian Research Council grant to further develop an environmentally friendly process that uses plastic waste as an alternative to coal-based carbon for electric arc furnace (EAF) steelmaking.

The technology is being given an industrial-scale workout with industry partner, the steelmaking giant OneSteel. Sporting a protective gear, Veena loves to watch the steelmaking furnace in action, with fireworks sparking off the river of molten slag. It was her fascination for fiery furnaces and rugged conditions that convinced her to join metallurgical engineering at IIT-Kanpur.

“I was the only girl in a class of 30. To put it mildly, it was a tough situation. The teachers understood my dilemma but even if there was one more girl, it would have been a lot easier,” says Veena, who literally made it in a man’s world by topping the class.

She recalls IIT-K as one of the most technically challenging places. “The four years prepared me to face the world and provided a new perspective into engineering and life in general. When I moved to IIT, I didn’t think of dressing any different than what I was used to — wearing trousers and shirts. But in an institution where people come from all over India, my outfit wasn’t what many were used to seeing girls wear. However, I stood by my values and ideals. And I learnt that in life and work, if one is passionate about what one does and sticks to it, there is no looking back,” says Veena, whose father is a civil engineer and mother a paediatrician.

“Our dinner-table conversations always centred round science,” she recalls. Veena met her engineer husband at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver. “It was refreshing to find an Indian man in Canada who could relate to what I had gone through at college,” she adds. She then enrolled for a doctorate in ‘Material science and engineering’ at Michigan (US). In 1994, professional opportunities brought them to Australia.

Waste to value-added resource

Speaking in Melbourne recently at L’Oréal Australia’s launch of ‘For Women in Science programme’, Veena said, “By converting waste into a value-added resource we are promoting sustainability. There are so many materials that should be recycled and if we can’t, we ought to develop products that can be reused at the end of their lifecycles.”

University of New South Wales’ (UNSW) commercial arm, NewSouth Innovations, has applied for a worldwide patent for Veena’s process, which holds the promise of an environmental win-win — significantly cutting the steel industry’s coal use and greenhouse gas emissions, while preventing tonnes of plastic waste ending up in landfill.

According to Veena, 40 per cent of the world’s steel production already takes place through the EAF route, which manufactures steel from scrap metal. “Steel recycling is common practice and scrap steel has become a valuable commodity because there is a technology that can accept it. My vision is that we as engineers and scientists should actually be developing technologies and processes or enhancing existing processes that can use all kinds of waste resources. This is exciting because the possibilities are endless!”

Finding the fine balance

Today, she leads the research on Sustainable Materials Processing at UNSW in Sydney. Along with her research team, she works with many companies across the globe that support her research focusing on sustainability of materials processing, including recycling of waste in steelmaking, lowering of energy and emissions in metals processing, iron/steelmaking technologies, ferro-alloys and non-ferrous metals processing.

A recipient of many international and national awards, most recently she won the 2006 Environmental Technology Award from the Association of Iron & Steel Technology in the US and the 2005 Eureka Prize for Scientific Research.

Veena says, “Keeping work and family balance is an important issue to all of us, including men! When children see that we all support each other, they are learning that in a family unit we should understand each other’s needs and provide support. We have open channels of communication, including when my daughters remind me that my performance on a certain day might not win me the ‘mother of the year’ award!”

Women represent a mere 27 per cent of researchers worldwide. In Australia, women represent 37 per cent of science professionals across all disciplines including life sciences, material sciences, mathematics and engineering. Veena has been encouraging young people to consider science and engineering as a career path.

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