Award-winning researcher, Prof Tebogo Mashifana is challenging the status quo of the more than R110-billion cement industry with her innovative work of turning waste into products that can be used in the building and construction sector.
The product, which she developed with such gusto to replace cement, has been snubbed by the cement and construction industry at large.
While the 37-year-old Mashifana was expecting some resistance from the cement companies, after all the binder which she and her team have developed completely replaces the need for cement, she did not expect a complete snub.
With the cement producing process being one of the major contributors of greenhouse gas emissions, which directly contribute to global warming and climate change, she expected some commitment to the circular economy from the industry, which just this year was expected to grow by 3.2% on an annual basis to reach $6.02-billion (about R111-billion), according to South African Industry Report 2024.
Despite the stumbling blocks, the chemical and civil engineering expert is even more fired up to turn waste into products that can be used in the building and construction industries. “We don’t have an unlimited supply of natural resources and we have only one earth,” she said.
Winning the Emerging Researcher Award on July 11 at the National Science and Technology Forum Awards has also emboldened her to reach out to more industries and entrepreneurs for opportunities to commercialise her ideas.
Mashifana, the senior lecturer and head of the Department of Chemical Engineering Technology at the University of Johannesburg, was recognised for her research on innovative circular economy principles to remedy the environmental impact caused by wastewater and solid waste.
This week, Mashifana was awarded a Y2 rating by the National Research Foundation (NRF). The Y2-rating is for researchers under 40 years who have the potential to establish themselves as researchers just based on recent research products. She joins an uber select group of under 4 400 researchers in the country who are NRF-rated.
For the mother of two from Sehlakwane in Limpopo, there is no such thing as waste but an economy waiting to be created to turn that waste into various products – and creating much-needed jobs.
From the eyesores and health hazards that are mine dumps, to the black clouds of smoke that billow in Mpumalanga from the burning of fossil
fuels for electricity production and solid waste from industrial and human activity, for Mashifana there is a product to be developed, not only to mitigate the damage to the environment but to also create jobs in the communities affected.
“Waste is the new gold. It is the new wealth,” she said, “That is why people come from developed countries to South Africa to look at what we call waste and turn it into money for their own countries,” she said.
Mashifana and her team have created bricks using gold tailing or what is commonly referred to as mine dumps.
“One of the biggest wastes generated in the gold mining industry are tailings, which are polluting the environment. These mountains of tailings are not just solid material there are contaminants in there,” she said.
“If that mine dump is situated within a community, the people inhale that dust if it’s windy, resulting in health problems. I took a decision then that I need to solve this problem,” she said.
Mashifana said she didn’t know back then as a chemical engineering student that she was entering the foray of what is called the circular economy, which involves finding innovative ways of re-purposing waste and developing new products.
After completing her degree in chemical engineering, she continued to do her Master’s in the same field but changed to civil engineering in her PhD studies, focusing on gold tailing especially in the Phalaborwa area of Limpopo and parts of KwaZulu-Natal.
“The work has developed beyond the building and construction sector. I have worked on projects to treat water waste. My research moves from the premise that in developing any product, I’m not going to use any commercial product but 100% waste material,” she said.
With these bricks and the binder developed from waste generated by the foundry industry, which comprises the steel and aluminium sectors, building and construction materials has been created.
For the millions of unsafe corrugated shacks that are prone to catching fire, Mashifana has a solution in the form of bricks made from plastic waste and foundry sand. For pupils who wear black shoes, she and her team have shoe polish made from tyres, and for girls sanitary pads from waste paper and waste banana fibre.
All that is missing is the support of industry and for the legislation and policies to catch up with innovations in the circular economy to bring all these products to commercialisation.
Mashifana understands she is at the forefront of creating a developing industry that will take decades to flourish. But when South Africa gets out of its inertia, the arduous work would have long been done, she said.
