Phenomenal response to free carton collections

The Alliance for Beverage Cartons and the Environment has reported that since it started offering a free bring bank service to local authorities earlier this year (see letsrecycle.com story), councils have continued to sign up for the service.

At this rate, the organisation believes that carton recycling will be available in every part of the county in 2008 when it expects to turn its attention to moving the service to the kerbside.

Led by carton manufacturer Tetra Pak, ACE UK has already began talks with materials recycling facilities to see how to get cartons included in the list of materials they can accept in order to be suitable for commingled collections.

Richard Hands, Tetra Pak environment manager, told letsrecycle.com: “At the beginning of the year we started out with the objective of getting 70% of councils to collect cartons and we now have collections in around 310 councils which is over 70% and it goes up day by day. We expect to achieve national coverage – as much as national coverage is possible – by the early part of next year.”

Welcomed 

Although the fast roll out of beverage carton collections has had some inevitable teething problems – such as householders forgetting to squash the cartons which then clog up banks – the move has welcomed by cash-strapped councils who are eager to divert waste from landfill.

Last week, the chair of Selby council's Environment board Cllr Chris Metcalfe, Chair of Selby District Council Environment Board, welcomed the new service in his area, by saying: “As many residents will know Selby District Council already offers a comprehensive range of recycling services and this new service for cartons is a great addition to the current services.”

Fay Dashper, Tetra Pak's recycling manager, explained: “The response has been phenomenal in many areas so much so that more banks are needed in some places.”

Each year, UK beverage carton manufacturers produce around 55,000 tonnes of paper-based cartons for milk, juice, sauces and other liquid foods and drinks. This equates to more than 2kg per household which could be recycled instead of thrown in the rubbish bin.

Under the ACE scheme, councils receive up to five bring banks which are serviced by one of six regional contractors including waste management firms Recresco and AbitibiBowater Recycling Europe.

Once stockpiled, the cartons are picked up by Tetra Pak and sent to the Orebro plasterboard mill in Sweden for reprocessing, as there are currently no mills in the UK to process them.

So far, the scheme has cost around the £3 million estimated by ACE, and is expected to cost a similar amount next year.

Although no details of tonnage have yet emerged, Mr Hands explained that many more banks were in the pipeline for the remaining 30% of councils not collecting cartons and that more would also be rolled out in other areas.

He said: “As cartons are a new material stream the service took a little time to sink in but there has been lots of media coverage and within a few weeks we were having to increase the number and size of banks in most areas.”