Yorwaste installs 300,000 glass separation system

Waste management firm Yorwaste has installed a 300,000 system to separate clean glass from commingled material at its materials recycling facility (MRF) in Seamer Carr near Scarborough.

According to the company, the system utilises sorting technology from the UK and the USA which will allow it to achieve recycling rates of 97% on all glass that is fed through the facility.

Mixed recycling arriving at the MRF is loaded onto a conveyor belt, before the glass is separated from other material via a two-deck breaker screen. Rotating discs also break the glass into various sizes before they fall into two bays, depending on size.

The glass is separated into two size fractions, with anything over 12mm being sent back for re-melting back into glass and anything under that size used in the aggregate market for construction products such as concrete.

The equipment design was completed the Yorwaste recycling team in conjunction with MRF systems manufacturer Ken Mills Engineering, which also installed the technology.

Yorwastes Seamer Carr MRF processes 11,000 tonnes per year of household material collected by Redcar and Cleveland borough council under a five-year contract that began in September 2013 (see letsrecycle.com story).

The facility also takes waste streams from Scarborough borough council, Harrogate borough council, Craven district council and Lincolnshire county council, as well as commercial collections. It has the capacity to process up to 13 tonnes per hour of mixed plastics, cans and glass.

Demand

Chris Tomlinson, continuous improvement manager at Yorwaste, said: There is a big demand for clean glass for sale in the glass and aggregate recycling markets, so using the new system we are able to produce a product of the highest quality.

Not only does this help us improve our customers recycling rates, in many cases we are also able to offer them a rebate on the material we send for final reprocessing.

He added: This system places Yorwaste at the forefront of commingled recycling that includes glass and further development of the system will take place going forward as part of our continuous improvement strategy. This will ensure that we remain a leader in materials recovery and offer best value for all our customers.

Seamer Carr

As well as the 800,000 MRF, which opened in 2008, the Seamer Carr site also contains facilities for green waste composting, aggregates recycling and a household waste recycling centre (see letsrecycle.com story).

In January, Yorwaste struck a 10-year deal to collect and process material from Scarborough borough council under a 5 million contract which starts this month, although this will see dry recycling processed at UPMs Shotton MRF (see letsrecycle.com story).

Recresco is another recycling firm that has invested in new glass separating technology, which its 5.5 million, 200,000 tonnes per year capacity glass plant nearing completion in Swanscombe, Kent (see letsrecycle.com story).

This followed Yorkshire-based Berrymans 9 million investment in upgrading its Knottingley glass plant as well as funding the colour separation equipment at its South Kirby facility (see letsrecycle.com story).