With LEGO® the future of the environment is colorful

The project explains the sophistication and efficiency of the waste treatment process managed daily by Acea at its dedicated composting and waste recovery plants. And it does so using a construction game, which in social imaginary can mean only one thing: LEGO®.

LEGO® bricks and Acea to build a sustainable future

For this project Acea has chosen the popular building bricks because of their huge communication and evocative potential. But there is more to the connection between the Group and LEGO®, and it is all about building.

Building a more sustainable future, as Acea is committed to doing by managing waste and recovering materials in the spirit of circular economy; and building communication with the community to help create a more aware vision of the importance of the plants.

The protagonists of the story: LEGO® construction kits.

“The Acea Ambiente plants that we have put at the center of the construction brick narrative are those that today play a key role in preparing materials for the transformation process”, Giovanni Vivarelli* explains. Each plant has been replicated in multiple copies of LEGO® models. A fully assembled 115x115 cm version of the plant is showcased at the entrance of each plant represented. Other smaller size versions with pre-prepared pieces have been created and made available inside kit bags to be handed out to students: each school receives 100. 

Since the partnership started in 2018, BrickVision LEGO® Certified Professional Riccardo Zangelmi’s team has completed three creations based on three plants: Monterotondo Marittimo composting plant, in the province of Grosseto, the largest in Tuscany, and the two waste-to-energy plants in Terni and San Vittore del Lazio, the latter on show since early 2021. “These are the most complex plants of the waste management process and the aim is to reduce the amount of non-reusable waste to zero, recovering the entire amount of incoming waste to generate new resources and secondary raw materials”.

LEGO® construction bricks are the best way to represent the presence and solidity of these plants: students can build them with their own hands, see them close up, and understand how they operate. The environment and waste management plants are not on different planets: “there is no dichotomy, when managed sustainably and respecting the environment, they are connected”, Vivarelli explains, “LEGO® bricks are key to communicating with the young generations, offering them an experience that combines emotionality and practicality”.

To turn the idea into an actual project to contact Riccardo Zangelmi, who is the only Italian in a group of 19 people across the world, authorized to reproduce personalized models using the Danish brand’s LEGO® bricks. The artist accepted the proposal of a collaboration and fully embraced Acea’s communication mission taking on the most challenging aspects of the project.

"Each LEGO® sculpture is a unique challenge that induces us to think big. The Acea plants we have reproduced are imposing buildings and on the inside they work in unique and complex ways – I learned this myself during my visits on-site. The team and I took on the challenge of reproducing them in scale in the most realistic way possible”, says Riccardo Zangelmi. “We strived to create aesthetically pleasing models that faithfully reproduce the plants, but at the same time are easy to build, to ensure that putting them together provides an enjoyable and educational activity to do together."

In the meantime, Acea and the artist are enjoying the project’s first signs of success, as the enthusiasm of the people who work at the plants where these works of art have been delivered has triggered a race to get hold of kit bags. “The large LEGO® brick scale model has a great visual impact”, says Giacanelli (Acea Spa). “Aside from being beautiful, it is an immediate reminder of the construction bricks we loved as children. They send a unique message. This is why for this project we decided to seek the involvement of a LEGO® Artist and his team. The idea is to communicate with the young generations using the construction bricks, as well as videos and visits to the plant. I am sure that in future this method will become standard practice”.