Mark Shaw

Why you should listen

On graduating from college, Mark Shaw saw a news broadcast on a toxic waste clean-up called Love Canal. The footage showed leaking steel drums of toxic waste being lowered into larger steel drums. It was then he was inspired to “save the world from toxic waste” and build a drum that would never leak. At 23, an economics major working out of a rented storage locker, he developed his first patent, an overpack container with resistance wiring built into the lid that would automatically heat-weld the lid to the container with the push of a button. He dubbed it “Macroencapsulation” and today, it is not only an EPA-approved treatment for hazardous waste but is also used extensively at the U.S. Department of Energy National Labs for shipping and treating mixed radioactive waste that is both chemically and radioactively hazardous. Many of his inventions and products have become the market standard worldwide. Shaw and his companies are also pioneers in the spill containment, stormwater management and spill response industries and are now bringing over 500 practical and innovative products and technologies to industry on a global basis through its 1,500 distributors covering 40 countries.