It appears Turkey has become the latest dumping ground for our “recycled” plastic.

Barking mad situation where we allow companies to export our plastic waste to be “recycled” to countries which have no plastic recycling infrastructure and are then “suprised” to find its just being burnt / dumped in the sea.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/may/17/uk-plastics-sent-for-recycling-in-turkey-dumped-and-burned-greenpeace-finds

Yeah, pretty disgusting & makes a mockery of all time & effort a lot of people go to, to separate their waste, wash it etc.

Its the destroying of confidence in the system that’s a big issue too. People stop bothering.

I suppose the big question is how much due diligence are our exporters doing, if it’s a case of can you recycle my contaminated mixed plastic with a response of yeah no problem then the exporter is culpable. If they have checked out the recycling facilities exist, there’s capacity and an outlet for the recycled materials then it’s down to the Turks to police their cowboy operators. The Turks do have a duty to check the legitimacy of their importers and block any imports to the dodgy ones.

All of our household waste goes to an incinerator that contributes to a community heating scheme (including the City’s University). On balance, I sometimes wonder if its better to just put everything in the regular bin rather than the recycling.

Bear in mind though that a lot of that stuff that’s getting burned may be rubbish anyway, the stuff that some people put in there recycling bin is often food contaminated or unrecyclabale anyway, so may have always been destined for landfill or incineration.

I don’t see the need for naming all the supermarkets in that article, other than possibly shaming them in to using biodegradable / less plastic packaging.

I suppose the big question is how much due diligence are our exporters doing, if it’s a case of can you recycle my contaminated mixed plastic with a response of yeah no problem then the exporter is culpable.

Everyone is culpable, it’s a huge poorly hidden secret that most recycled plastic is never recycled. It’s sold through middle men so Local Authorities / Supermarkets can say they have recycled so many tons of waste because they have a piece of paper saying ‘sold on for recycling’. However, they all know it just ends up being dumped / burnt.

It should be illegal to export plastic for recycling, it should have to be recycled in the country of use. That would make it obvious to all that there isn’t a market / business case / facilities to recycle most of it. Then, perhaps, we might consider not using it in the first place…..

I don’t see the need for naming all the supermarkets in that article, other than possibly shaming them in to using biodegradable / less plastic packaging.

They are 100% aware of what is happening and are 100% complicit in the whole sham.

This isn’t new news, it’s being going on for years – it’s been on TV, BBC did a program with Fernely Whitinstal (or whatever he’s call) finding piles of smouldering UK supermarket plastic wrapping in Indonesia.

The whole residential recycling process absolves the polluters of responsibility. They can generate as much plastic waste as they want because the solution is for the consumers to ‘recycle it’ only there is no plastc recycling on any reasonable scale anywhere in the world. A few boutqiue companies recycle a very small percentage for Green washed brands eg Patagonia so they make recycled fleeces etc, but 99.9% is just burnt or dumped in the sea.

I’m pretty sceptical about how much of our “recycling” gets processed and recycled properly. We have 3 bins: non-recyclable – incinerator, glass (mixed colours), and mixed plastic, paper, cardboard, cans etc.

The amount of work that would have to go into sorting the mixed recycling to make it useable must be collossal. I am not convinced it really happens at all and like others suspect it gets shipped halfway round the world and burnt.

I suppose the big question is

What are you doing to reduce your plastic waste?

Or shipped halfway round the world to a landfill, where the poor sort out the recycling to make a living.

I do think that there is a massive need to invest in recycling facilities in this country, there must be loads of jobs to be created and money to be made, there might even be some environmental benefits too.

I only recently found out why black plastic (typically ready meal trays) could not be recycled…. The technology that recycling centres use cannot ‘see’ black plastic against their black conveyor belts.

I was on Zoom chat when I found this out (someone in charge of a recycling centre giving a chat about recycling), so when I pointed out that for years we have been told that these plastics weren’t recyclable, that the onus to change the packaging has been put on the whole food industry to change which has taken time and a lot of expense….WHY HAVEN’T YOU JUST CHANGED THE COLOUR OF THE BELTS ON THE SCANNING SECTION FROM BLACK TO ANOTHER COLOUR THAT WONT CAUSE ANY ISSUES?!

Was met with stunned silence and the host unable to give an answer. I can’t be the only one who hasn’t thought of this!

I may be naive, but I always thought that waste plastic would/should be easy to form in to well insulated building blocks?
A bit like those companies that reuse shredded tyre rubber for part of roads and footpaths.

What are you doing to reduce your plastic waste?

Until Governments tax plastic at use it will just get harder and harder to avoid it. Expecting the consumer to avoid it / recycle it is just pissing in the ocean. Plastic is so cheap and convenient, manufactueres need a good reason not to choose it. If Tesco is squeezing your margins on supplying sandwiches (or whatever) and swapping cardboard for plastic saves 1p per packet, you’ll end up making that choice. If plastic packaging carried a 50p levy – you might think twice.

I may be naive, but I always thought that waste plastic would/should be easy to form in to well insulated building blocks?

Just because it could doesn’t mean it will be. There has to be a good business case for it and a steady supply of material of reliable quality and a steady demand for the end product. Then someone has to invest a few £m building a factory to do it etc.

Then someone has to invest a few £m building a factory to do it etc.

I will txt BoJo.
It would be a far better legacy than a garden bridge or a sea tunnel. 🙂

Not on any scale obvs but I was working on post earthquake rebuilding project out in Nepal and they would sometimes stuff plastic waste (wrappers/packets etc) into glass bottles as tight as possible then set it into walls on builds as insulation.

Far from ideal but a lot better than burning it or leaving it lying around.

taxing at source on plastics doesn’t work, 1 there will always be people finding work arounds, 2 it diverts the possible investment people are willing to put into recycling – it’s the usual stick vs carrot scenario – incentivise to recycle, not disincentivise to not use..

Plastic is being recylced into pyroil and this go back into the plastics indiustry. There are other options being looked at specifically in fuels, but they need to be given the same credientials as their non-fossil sustaianable counterparts -we’re hopeful the UK gov will give this approval soon.

it is a cryting shame that this dumping still goes on and is unfortunately typical of Western European policy of “not on my doorstep, so therefore it doesn’t count” mentality – battery production is the same and the reason it’s got such a “green” image..

We spend a lot of time making sure plastic is cleaned/degreased, the film that is glued on top the plastic is removed etc. Disappointed to say the least if our local council is sending this on to a middle man and getting rid by dubious means. It’s the entire facade of it all. Deliver new recycling bins (made of plastic) to houses/flats to then ask people to sort their rubbish, then have “recycling” trucks come and pick it up. It then ends up in a molten pile somewhere else in the world destroying an eco system or 10( who knows how many).

There is a means to sort this out, it exists, it might not be profitable, but has been possible for some time. Add this to the pile of wanting to do our bit but the powers that be pay lip service to it all.

Yeah it’s a joke how little plastic (and other stuff) is actually recycled, even when it stays in this country. A C4 Dispatches program on a few weeks ago covered it fairly well. Depends where you are in the country but a lot of the time it’s just being incinerated and those plants not only just need to report CO2 emissions (not the other nasty stuff they merrily pollute the air with) but they can even offset that against the CO2 they’re saving vs if coal was generating the power they are so it makes them look much better for CO2 than they actually are.

Domestic recycling in the grand scheme of things doesn’t really help!
Taxing at source or making the polluter pay would be more effective.

The reason black plastic is hard to recycle is actually because infra-red sensors are used to sort material and dark colours absorb too much light (rather than reflect).

I like the idea of re-use though. In reality, very little recycled material is mixed in to new products, as the quality is poorer.
Collecting and re-using through community projects is a good one imo:
https://preciousplastic.com/

I was on Zoom chat when I found this out (someone in charge of a recycling centre giving a chat about recycling), so when I pointed out that for years we have been told that these plastics weren’t recyclable, that the onus to change the packaging has been put on the whole food industry to change which has taken time and a lot of expense….WHY HAVEN’T YOU JUST CHANGED THE COLOUR OF THE BELTS ON THE SCANNING SECTION FROM BLACK TO ANOTHER COLOUR THAT WONT CAUSE ANY ISSUES?!

Was met with stunned silence and the host unable to give an answer. I can’t be the only one who hasn’t thought of this!

I think the speaker was almost write, but also wrong… its not the ability to “see” the black plastic against the black conveyor that is the issue – its that the sorting system tell which plastic it is using NIR spectroscopy, and NIR can’t tell the difference between the plastics when they are full of carbon black (the most common black colourant).

Plastic waste is comprised of a huge variety of different compositions, and degrades with the recycling process. It might be that the best we can do with it is incinerate it as fuel (with as much pollution control as is needed), and recover the heat for other uses (like the Scandinavians do – they buy the stuff by the boatload).

I may be naive, but I always thought that waste plastic would/should be easy to form in to well insulated building blocks?

Plastic Blocks Used as Building Material

There’s a company in Columbia making them for buildings in Africa. This report says they’re using recycled plastic, but not the percentage per brick (I don’t think) so they may only use a small amount of recycled plastic.

I don’t mean to sound mean, but if those bricks are so good, why aren’t we using them here?

Expecting the consumer to avoid it / recycle it is just pissing in the ocean.

That is true, but there are things that we can & should all do, look up the places that do the refills & use them, choose the non plastic options, some of them may have a higher energy cost which I admit is a difficult balancing act with what environmental damage is caused. At the end of the day we as individuals need to start taking responsibility for our actions rather than blaming the powers that be for not cleaning up properly after us.

I tend to watch news stories on recycling, especially plastics, with a heavy heart. I’ve been in the industry for nearly twenty years and currently work for a small local authority in Devon. We know where all of our plastic goes. None of it leaves Europe and the different types of polymer go to specific reprocessing or manufacturing sites. We work very closely with our local transfer station to ensure they manage the material we give them carefully, unfortunately the picture isn’t the same nationwide. We run a kerbside sort based collection as opposed to large co-mingled wheelie bins for recycling. It tends to make the material easier to sort into different grades.

We face a lot of problems in the UK with regard to recycling generally, not just plastics. One of the main ones is we just don’t have enough processing infrastructure. It is hard to finance and even harder to find end markets for some of the materials. Only food grade plastic can go back into food grade products for example, unless you want to run VERY expensive processing lines, and establishing closed loop manufacturing/ recycling processes is difficult.

The legislative drivers are also all wrong with local authorities given the responsibility for picking stuff up when we have no say in what is placed on the market in the first place. There are several consultations being run by Government at the moment on enhanced producer responsibility, deposit return schemes and consistency in the way councils collect stuff. These may lead to some positive changes but packaging producers and retailers are already kicking off about the increased costs they will face for placing certain products on the market.

As said by others above black plastic can’t be easily read by the NIR scanning heads used at sorting plants. If it makes you feel any better black plastic is usually clear or coloured plastic flake that has been recycled at least 6 or 7 seven times at which point it is no longer able to hold a specific colour. It gets dyed black and given one final use before it goes to the incinerator.

Thanks @Big-Dave That was an interesting read. I’m in Devon and we have just in the last month or so started a kerbside sorted collection service for recycling. Co-incidentally I sent a message to my local councillor only this morning to see if they were able to obtain any information about the destination of our plastic recycling. The detail on the contractor’s website is a little on the vague side and did not instil much confidence.

the quote about plastic waste just being incinerated and only reporting CO2 and not the other nasty stuff in the UK is cobblers I’m afraid. Most wastes with a decent calorific Value go into the new breed of EFW plants to generate electricity. The emissions are tightly regulated and have been for years, with each site being a permitted facility, strict air emission guidelines for particulates, acid gases, VOC’s, Dioxins, Furans etc.., continuous monitors and then annual extractive sampling via MCERTs accredited emissions testing companies, all of which is reported to the EA and a matter of public record.

Plastic sorting in waste industry, is actually pretty good these days (with the usual caveats about low grade plastics, films and black plastics) with modern optical sorting systems and good old fashioned picking sheds on the lines.

The problem is what happens with sorted wastes, particularly the low value stuff as that tends to get shipped off and then ignored.

There are lots of UK innovative companies looking and working with systems to make the plastics into replacements for industrial flooring, fence posts, wall panels instead of gypsum and so on. I even worked with a company looking at recycling the plastics from treated non anatomical clinical waste, but we as the public didn’t want the stigma of “clinical waste” in our domestic building materials so the project failed. The material is now sent as an incineration feedstock

Multiple issues here but no country does that well even Germany that is often hailed as the best recycling country in the world by some margin. IN reality only about 15% of Germany’s plastic actually gets made into other plastic products, the rest is either incinerated or exported where it goes into some other country’s landfill or dumped somehow. Better than us but far from good no matter how you cut it.

Part of the problem is the different types of plastic and contamination. Its just too hard to separate. We need some industry wide rules that specify what type of plastic should be use to avoid mixed plastic types and with ersimpler packaging from one material or force people to dismantle packaging when they recycle…I do – I’ll peel off all the sellotape from cardboard boxes, peel out the transparent plastic windows and dismantle the packaging. The wife things I’m bonkers but though some effort from us its alot less effort than having to do it at some recycling centre when faced with a pile of several hundred tons of packaging.

A big part of the issue, like many problems, is trying to achieve socially and environmentally desirable outcomes and relying on a market economy to deliver that. With a deregulation mantra from increasingly right wing politicians it ain’t going to happen.

@deltacharlie72, you wouldn’t happen to be in South Hams would you? I’ve been hearing horror stories about the roll out of the new services there. Having had to be in the roll out of new services myself I know is isn’t easy.

@Big-Dave Yep! South Hams 🙂

We’re about 4 weeks in now I think, and let’s just say it’s not been a particularly smooth transition. It doesn’t seem to have been particularly well received by either residents or the collection crews.

Each household now has 2 wheelie bins, 2 recycling boxes, a food waste box and a heavy duty woven poly bag. Needless to say lots of people simply don’t have room for all of these. We’ve had whole streets missed off the collection, conflicting info seemingly given to crews and residents about what will/won’t be collected, and storm force winds on collection day which blew boxes, bags and recycling all over the estate. That said, lots of us are very pleased to be able to now recycle much more of our waste. Especially the plastics. It’s just going to take a little time for everyone to adapt.

The area Facebook group is a constant source of entertainment every collection day, as various people lose their shit, vent and rant about the perceived ridiculousness of the new arrangements. #BinDayDramas

It will settle down. I think the contractor and South Hams Council got their round modelling a little wrong from what I’ve heard and possibly underestimated how many of the new lorries they will need. They fill up quick and the crews have to learn how to load them efficiently.

It always makes me smile a bit when our customers go totally ape over missed collections and rejected boxes. Yes it is important but I always tell our staff there is no point getting upset over other peoples rubbish. If we miss a recycling collection it is a service failure that needs to be corrected but it will still be there tomorrow; it ain’t as if anybody is going to steal it.

Given everyone’s clear interest in this subject, you are luckily just in time to participate in these 2nd round consultations on the government’s Environment Bill:

https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/consistency-in-household-and-business-recycling-in-england

https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/introduction-of-a-deposit-return-scheme-in-england-wales-and-northern-ireland

https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/packaging-and-packaging-waste-introducing-extended-producer-responsibility

Most of these changes are slated for implementation from 2023 or 2024. Plus, the new Plastic Packaging Tax is due to be implemented from 1 April 2022:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/get-your-business-ready-for-the-plastic-packaging-tax

As important as domestic recycling is, industry must be where the big wins can be had. I’m in the sign making business there are very few recycled options for us to use that will last anywhere as long as a recycled option. Any of the non recycled materials we have available are not recyclable. The only sub strait we have had luck recycling Any waste from, was our aluminium composite sheet. This stopped when the price of aluminium dropped below a level that made it worthwhile. I am hopeful that this will change again soon as the aluminium price has risen quite a bit.

Last Week Tonight on recycling

“Recycling” is a scam to keep firing out endless plastic in the name of capitilism.

It puts the responsibility on the consumers, essentially victim blaming you if you don’t/can’t, rather than not giving it to you in the first place.

Think about frozen pizzas.

The economy ones come in a super thin polythene bag.

The expensive ones come in a thicker plastic bag and brightly coloured, glossy box so it gives a more “premium” sense, hence the expense.

You’re not buying a much better pizza, you’re getting a slightly better pizza and a load of environmental waste to make it look nicer.

Packaging, especially secondary packaging (a box, sleeve on top of what is needed) should heavily regulated.

We shouldn’t even need a plastics recycling bin for each household. If M&S can put their fish fingers just loose in a card box then I’m sure everyone else can, too.

.WHY HAVEN’T YOU JUST CHANGED THE COLOUR OF THE BELTS ON THE SCANNING SECTION FROM BLACK TO ANOTHER COLOUR THAT WONT CAUSE ANY ISSUES?!

This is actually solved easier than that. I work for a sensor manufacturer and we are hugely experienced in this kind of thing. Sensors can be setup in different ways to detect and object, and this scenario you have two options. Setup a ‘window’ which is theoretically from below the belt to a fixed distance above it, or use ultrasonic. It is not effected by colour, and you can set it up to detect the belt. Anything over it is detected. I have approached a couple of recycling companies who make waste handling systems and they seem to be stuck their ways.

The plastics issue is something that really bothers me personally.

Latest update shows the Hippy Yoghurt-weavers achieved something:

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/may/19/turkey-to-ban-plastic-waste-imports