The project, which will also involve London Remade, will seek to process around 36,000 tonnes of plastic bottles and is being promoted by Australian company Visy Closed Loop.
” We will look to get hold of the bottles locally “
– Hugh Carr-Harris, Closed Loop London
The plant will be worth about 12 million, with 8 million of this going on equipment. Bottles will be sorted, reprocessed and cleaned. The recovered PET material – taken from soft drinks bottles – will be used to produce food packaging.
Hugh Carr-Harris
Mr Carr-Harris returns to the UK as chief executive of Closed Loop London, the UK arm of Visy and the key supporter of the plant – which is to be built in Dagenham. Mr Carr-Harris left London Remade in October of last year to spend more time with his family.
Mr Carr-Harris explained that the initial plan for the plant is to take bottles from London and the South-East, but expansion plans are likely to follow soon after.
“We will look to get hold of the bottles locally,” he told letsrecycle.com. “But inevitably we will look to further a field in the UK and probably mainland Europe as we look to fill the plant.”
Problems
Ironically, plastic bottle collection is not carried out by London's biggest collector of recyclables, the community sector organisation ECT Recycling.
ECT – which currently runs waste management contracts in Ealing, Hounslow and Barnet – has said that the costs for collecting plastics are currently too high because of the low density of the material. The company's chief executive Stephen Sears recently said that ECT would only collect the material if one of its clients specifically requested it.
But Mr Carr-Harris pointed out that the Dagenham plant has the backing of London mayor Ken Livingstone. Mr Carr-Harris said that his support and London Remade's close relationship with the London borough would help bring more plastic collections from London boroughs (see letsrecycle.com story)
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As part of Closed Loop London's work towards the plant it has been trialling end products for the plastic in an attempt to “close the loop.” The company has been working with Boots and Marks & Spencer on the use of recycled plastic in food packaging.
The size of the plant is already causing some concern within the plastic recycling sector because of the current low level of PET bottle collection and the impact that a new London plant might have on other collectors and reprocessors.
WRAP
Also involved with the trial is the waste and resources action programme, which has supported the project. wrap'S material sector manager Paul Davidson has welcomed the possibility of a new plant – despite it possibly hurting another WRAP funded project.
St Helens based recycler JFC Delleve received WRAP funding for a sorting plant at its ST Helens site. The company is currently the only reprocessor of PET plastic in the UK (see letsrecycle.com story)
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WRAP's material sector manager, Paul Davidson said: “Our aim is to see the collection of plastic bottles grow and the establishment of this plant will give the local authorities the confidence to increase collections and invest in growing the collections that they already have.
“WRAP does not think that the plant will hurt JFC Delleve – there is some 50,000 tonnes of plastic out there, so there is plenty to go around,” he added.
Ridiculous
JFC Delleve has said that it isn't worried about the new plant but it has said that it does fear desperation for the material could push prices up to “ridiculous” levels.
” My one fear is that having spent so much on the plant they spend ridiculous amounts of money trying to secure material to feed it “
– Lee Clayton, JFC Delleve
Lee Clayton, general manager for Delleve, said: “Over the past 15 years a lot of people have said they will be recycling PET, but we are still the only one. Competition is good, I look forward to it, if it goes ahead.
“My one fear is that having spent so much on the plant they spend ridiculous amounts of money trying to secure material to feed it. Plastic exporters already push the prices up, what we don't want is another company prepared to pay over the odds for material.”
Recoup
Plastic bottle organisation Recoup has backed the plant, quashing question marks as to why a country which is not yet collecting 50,000 tonnes of plastic a year actually needs a plant with such a high capacity.
Andrew Simmons, chief executive of Recoup, believes that the new plant can only bring benefits to the UK bottle collection and reprocessing industry.
“I would say there is a good level of growth in PET plastic, the demand is very strong for the material,” he said. “The new plant will open up an opportunity for more PET collections.”
Mr Simmons said he felt that by the end of this year the UK would have collected around 50,000 tonnes of plastic bottles, a little under half of this is likely to be PET, he explained.
“In three years time we will probably be collecting maybe 65,000 to 70,000 tonnes a year so there will be more than 30,000 tonnes of PET available.”
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