Green Waste Recycling (GWR) is a newcomer on the recycling scene, but it has already made an impact. How quickly has the company grown? We installed our first machines in November 2001 and we had three employees. In January 2002 we installed a second line of machinery and increased our employees to 18. We have just installed a fourth line of machinery and now we employ 26 people. This new recycling line allows us to handle 100 per cent fish box material, on its own, for the first time. This will give us access to a lot of 'contaminated' packaging material that has been used to package fresh fish. It could not be easily recycled before, because we had to mix the contaminated EPS packaging with clean used EPS packaging to get the required standard of the finished product. Is it easy to source the waste EPS packaging? No, it's a very competitive market out there. We take a lot of used fish boxes from the Grimsby area. These used to be sent to landfill, so we are pleased that we can recycle them. With our new production line the whole process is really efficient, so we are planning to increase the amounts of fish boxes that we recycle. We also recycle clean used EPS packaging, it is sourced from companies like Hoover, which has components delivered, packed in EPS. We are always on the look out for new sources of both clean or contaminated EPS packaging as we have the capacity to increase our recycling rates. Are you trying to identify and develop new waste streams to achieve your target amounts of EPS packaging? Absolutely! We are talking to waste management companies to see if they do any separation of their waste, but it is a slow process to get effective new systems in place. We are also in contact with distribution centres that repack goods to see if we can set up collection schemes from their warehouses. Lastly, we are constantly on the look out for electronics companies and retailers that are just putting their waste EPS into landfill. The vast majority of our recycling is EPS packaging so are always on the lookout for more of it. What would you like to say to companies that landfill all their EPS packaging waste? It is a shame that it is so easy for people to throw this material away and not think about the long-term effect of their action. Used EPS is a valuable resource that can have an extremely useful second life. We are an innovative company, constantly on the look out for new ways to recycle packaging waste. I work closely with our technical manager and we hope to continue developing new processes and new products that can be made from recycled packaging. Another of our objectives is to open up satellite sites across the UK and Ireland to try and cut down the transportation of the material, which is wasteful, both economically and environmentally. But top of the list over the next few years — we will be looking for more sources of waste expanded polystyrene packaging. Contact Gerry Dallimore on Tel no: 01685 359738
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