Last year, WRAP revealed that it had identified an unnamed preferred bidder for the grant. The preferred bidder was Cleanaway which had planned to build a plastics sorting facility at its Rainham material recovery facility with support from WRAP (see letsrecycle.com story). But the company is thought to have had concerns over whether it could find enough sources of bottles to supply the plant.
Paul Davidson, WRAP’s materials sector manager for plastics, said he could not confirm the name of either the first or second bidder. However, he was able to confirm: “The preferred bidder has withdrawn and we are currently in discussions with our reserve bidder.”
Mr Davidson said that he was optimistic about the new project being successful. He said: “The tendering processing is still continuing and there are still significant hurdles to overcome but hopefully we shall know one way or the other by the end of the year.”
WRAP's main targets for 2004 for plastics include a 20,000 tonne increase in mixed plastics reprocessing for industrial products and an increase of at least 20,000 tonnes in plastic bottle recycling.
One contender for the grant is expected to be Delleve which last year announced plans to build a plastics sorting facility in St Helen's to take material from the North West (see letsrecycle.com story). The company was depending on support from WRAP for the project which aims to recycle 20,000 tonnes of plastic bottles in its first five years of operation.
The market development agency has also set sector-specific targets to increase the recycled content of products and to identify at least one new technology to produce a composite product using recycled resins with wood or rubber.
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