Auto-City goes big on GREEN

Words by Carolyn Khor

Turning a notch up from being a landmark for auto, gated banking, F&B and night park shopping on the mainland of Penang, Auto-City has now set its eyes on being an educational hub on innovative green practices.

Groups wanting to learn about sustainable development made their way to Auto-City to see first-hand how Gary Teoh and spouse Bee Lee manage zero-waste on their premises. The model which Auto-City adopts is through its own in-house research, continuous improvement and fine-tuning for better results.

“We have our own team to do continuous research on the methods of composting, wastewater filtration and growing chemical-free and pesticide-free vegetables,” said Gary Teoh, founder and managing director of the Auto-City Group.

At Auto-City, all organic wastes are collected and turned into compost using several rotary machines, designed by Teoh. To produce good quality compost, other machines are used too, like the sorting machine and the drying machine, before the dry compost is ready to be used as fertilisers.

“The rotary machines consume very little electricity even though they are operating between 8 and 12 hours a day,” he said.

At Auto-City, waste water is also recycled through a bio-filtration process where microorganisms are used to neutralise the odour and harmful bacteria before channeling the treated water for use to water plants within the grounds.

Gary and Bee Lee work closely with their green-oriented team comprising of horticulturists and agriculturists. Auto-City now has vegetable plots that produce all sorts of vegetables which are given out to families and friends.

This is an eco-friendly corporate social responsibility project worth emulating.