Recoup paints bleak picture for mixed plastics

Local authorities stand to lose millions of pounds over the next five years if mixed plastics are added to kerbside collections before necessary infrastructure is constructed, trade body Recoup has warned.

Speaking at the LARAC Conference in Liverpool last week (November 4), Recoup chief executive John Simmons said an increased uptake of mixed plastic collections would make it difficult for reprocessors to extract plastic bottles from the plastic waste stream.

Mr Simmons said that the collection of plastics, largely bottles, is worth around £60 million-a-year to local authorities in revenue at present and his concerns centre on plastic trays and tubs – which he referred to as the ‘PTT stream'.

However, Mr Simmons warned that this figure could fall by as much as £20 million over the next five years because bottle reprocessors face higher costs either to separate used bottles from PTT or tackle contamination of bottle supplies which should not contain PTT.

“We need to be aware that we are forecasting [value] to come down and, as a very conservative estimate, by 2015 we will have lost around £20 million in revenue”, he said. “And that is if the main plastic reprocessors can extract material to work with.”

Mr Simmons said the heart of the issue was the limited amount of capable sorting infrastructure. He also warned about an over-reliance on a handful of mixed plastic reprocessors in the domestic market could leave the UK in a difficult situation if councils continue to introduce mixed plastic collections and there was any closure of plants or lack of capacity.

Wholesale

Discussing wholesale roll outs of mixed plastic collections, Mr Simmons used Italy as an example of installing mixed plastic collections “whole hog”. He said that only 15% of material had been recycled with the remainder either landfilled or, in most cases, sent for energy recovery.

He said: “We must not shrink away from talking to householders and saying this is a complicated problem and we need a staged approach. If we go the whole hog as Italy has shown us the way we must face some of the challenges…there is no quantitative easing in recycling I'm afraid.”

Assessing future growth in the plastic packaging sector, Mr Simmons said he expected there to be over one million tonnes of plastic packaging on the market by 2015. And, off the back of this continued growth, he said that Recoup was “confident” of meeting the higher 32% recycling targets for 2011 and 2012 announced by the government last month (see letsrecycle.com story).

Recoup published a guidance document in March 2009 on kerbside collections of non-plastic packaging, such as a yoghurt pots and trays. A key focus in the document was the need for suitable end markets to be place before councils adopt the material (see letsrecycle.com story).

“Very Serious”

In the question and answer session, Phillip Ward, director of local government services at WRAP, said that Mr Simmons had raised some “very serious” issues and added that mixed plastic collections needed to be “addressed seriously”, with local authorities having a role to play on the side of communications.

He said: “I know lots of people are carrying out mixed plastics collections but I don't know how far they are asking their waste companies about what they are going to do with this when they take it in. People need to be honest with their communications about the risks that not all of it will necessarily be recycled. This is a very serious issue and we need some clarity of communications around this.”

WRAP has outlined its intention to help grow the domestic mixed plastic recycling capacity, with a £2 million loan fund launched in July 2010 aiming to help companies overcome investment barriers (see letsrecycle.com story).