Opened by Scotland's environment minister, Ross Finnie, the ceremony saw major awards going to Fife-based FEAT Enterprises and Glasgow group Spruce Carpets.
 Celebration: (left to right) Iain Gulland of CRNS, Keith Guest of sponsors Novelis, Pauline Hinchion of FEAT Enterprises, Kate Atkinson of Spruce Carpets, Ray Georgeson of WRAP and Terry McDonald of US recycling group St. Vincent de Paul at the inaugural CRNS awards |
FEAT Enterprises which operates in Markinch, won the CRNS Member of the Year award for running the UK's first and only mattress recycling service.
Spruce Carpets took home the Innovation Award for their carpet reuse project, which cleans and refurbishes unwanted carpets to make them available to low income families.
Commenting on the awards, Community Recycling Network Scotland chair Matt Lewis said: “Both FEAT Enterprises and Spruce Carpets certainly demonstrate the best about community recycling. Not only are they both being innovative and dynamic in tackling difficult parts of the wastestream, they are also aiming to create local jobs and alleviate poverty in their respective communities.”
Member of the Year
Established two years ago, the Community Recycling Network for Scotland represents over 100 Scottish community-based recycling groups. Its Member of the Year Award acknowledged a “significant contribution to the community recycling sector in Scotland in the past year”.
Winners FEAT break down mattresses to sell on component parts to reprocessors, having secured contracts with local authorities and colleges to carry out the recycling of a difficult waste stream. CRNS praised the group for “heading towards becoming a self-sustaining social enterprise business while taking the time to advise other community recyclers”.
Other shortlisted organisations in the Member award included Alness-based electronics recycling group ILM (Highland), Isle of Bute kerbside recycling group Fyne Futures, furniture re-use group HomeAid West Lothian and Cumbernauld-based re-use group RECAP.
Innovation
The CRNS Innovation Award recognised a community recycling organisation that had “broken new ground” in the past year.
Winners Spruce Carpets are based in Glasgow and have been praised as the first carpet recycling organisation in Scotland. The group takes good quality, unwanted carpets from homes and officers to refurbish them for re-distribution to low-income households in the Glasgow area. CRNS said the group had developed an “entirely replicable model” that could be adopted across Scotland, using a material “previously untouched by the community sector”.
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Among the other nominees for the Innovation Award were awareness-raising community consortium CEIM for producing a promotional calendar; Isle of Skye group Touchwood for its recycled product-selling Tourist Information Centre; Aberdeen Forward for its waste exchange website; Isle of Islay group Re-Jig for their oil recycling scheme; and the Moray Recycling Action Group for a local recycling scheme in Moray.
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