Right through history, recycling has existed in one form or another. Even as long ago as 400 BC indications of earlier recycling are known to have occurred. Archaeological studies show that historical waste dumps contained less of what’s known nowadays as household waste, such as pots, tools and ash, which demonstrates that people were, even back then, keen to reuse products at a time when natural resources weren’t so freely available.
Indeed it may be argued how the old ‘rag-and-bone’ man was just an early recycler collectingdiscarded goods on his horse and cart, before reusing or turning the collected items into something new. The 60’s TV series, Steptoe and Son, brought this very much in to the public eye and greater attention.
During periods such as the World War Years, recycling and re-use were common place as natural materials became much more difficult to get. As well as food being rationed, certain materials including metal and fibre were largely permitted just for use by the government to support military operations, to satisfy manufacturing requirements often in the production of weaponry.
Because of rising power costs, the requirement to recycle aluminium increased during the 1970’s.. As a material aluminium utilises significantly less energy during the production process than some other materials. Plus it was much sought-after due to its non rusting properties. The need for aluminium saw the emergence of scrap metal dealers who were willing to pay cash in exchange for good quality metal. Additionally, in the 70’s in areas of the USA, the first vans were seen to be collecting waste with a separate trailer for gathering of recyclable resources being towed behind the vehicle. This was mainly for large bulky items including bedsteads and old carpets.
Into the late 1980’s, early nineties and as the awareness of managing the global environmental state heightened amongst worldwide authorities, the debate on recycling really started to gather impetus. In the United Kingdom, the authorities imposed recycling targets upon Local Authorities and with the introduction of the fresh new legislation upon the waste market, recycling programmes really started to take off. The once widely well known waste disposal corporations, began to call themselves waste management businesses and demonstrated with the offer of waste collection and recyclable materials collection that waste needed to be managed more efficiently. Local skip companies needed to become better at what they did.
Today, many hundreds of materials and products tend to be recycled, ranging from paper, card, glass and plastics, to mobile phones, electrical items, printer cartridges, textiles, clothing and concrete.
What is Recycling?
The term recycling describes the operation of converting used resources into new or nearly new products avoiding the need for potentially valuable materials or products to be thrown away.
Recycling plays a vital role in a world where climate change is high on the environmental agenda. It removes the need to unnecessarily send waste products and products to landfill or other waste disposal options. Consequently this lessens the demand and the reliance upon consuming fresh or new natural materials, cuts back energy usage and air and water pollution, that all contribute to lower greenhouse gas emissions.
Recycling would probably be mostnoticeable through the recycling solutions now provided by local councils for household refuse and recycling collections and also modern waste management companies who generally provide a full range of waste and recycling collection solutions.
Many offices and retail outlets require a commercial collection service log on to www.biffa.co.uk for details of the professional services on the market.
Within the waste material industry, the most popular advertising activity surrounds the waste material hierarchy – ‘reduce, reuse, recycle and recover’. This four R slogan is a basic message suitable for a far reaching crowd. Think about some ways to lessen your waste. Could the waste products or materials be reused? Could the waste product or material be recycled or retrieved? Many questions to think about.
The waste materials hierarchy is a strategy which various waste material management companies and local bodies look at when developing new waste management approaches. The strategy is intended to concentrate the thoughts around precluding waste material being generated to begin with. Take into account the options for reuse and recycling but ultimately minimise the amount of waste produced at the end of the cycle.
So the emphasis is very much on the whole production process. The waste materials hierarchy extends much wider than to waste management businesses and local bodies. Working groups have already been set up to bring many sectors together to consider the whole waste cycle. By way of example, the manufacturer of a product has to think about how the product will be designed. Can parts be used which can eventually be recycled or reused? Can the volume of packaging that surrounds the item be decreased? When the item reaches the store, is it necessary for the product to be located within an outer package? Once the retailer sells the product, what will the purchaser do with the excess elements of the purchase, i.e. the packaging? How will the packaging be stored and where will it go? Can it return to a recycling plant, for onward transfer to a reprocessing plant, in which the cycle will begin all over again?
How are Materials Collected for Recycling?
Legislation now dictates that all waste material should be processed to divert the volume of recyclables and unnecessary waste materials heading direct to landfill. Since 1996, the United Kingdom government has applied a landfill tax on all waste discarded within landfill. The rate of duty has increased considerably recently rising from the initial level of £8 per ton, to today’s rate of £40 per ton. The UK government has previously declared that this will increase further to £48 per ton by the end of 2010/11. This cost applies to all general waste streams, although there’s a reduced rate for inert products. Sending waste material directly to landfill is an expensive option and locating appropriate methods to divert waste out of landfill has become important.
Therefore, the message to everybody is crystal clear, sort your waste materials to cut back the amount of waste material going to landfill. In the past, both at home and at work, the instant you place waste material into the container , it is forgotten about. Another person will collect it and take it away. These days, in the home and at work, recycling is being stimulated through the supply of containers in which to place specific recyclable materials. At home, the children are often the keen recyclers.
Perhaps the most common products to be seen being collected for recycling are paper, card, glass, metals and plastics. Even so the possiblity to recycle many materials or products keep increasing. Although technically not seen as recycling, food waste and garden waste collections are increasing, where the food or garden waste material is taken back to a plant for processing into a reusable or saleable compost product.
Companies such as ours are fast providing energy recovering facilities to keep up with the ongoing challenge of what to do with all the waste materials we, as a nation, generate.
The methods of collecting items or waste to be recycled is also growing and ever more apparent within local communities. Specialist collection sites, often referred to as bring bank sites, are popping up in superstore car parks to motivate clientele of the store to return such objects as bottles, newspapers or card to the bins on their way into the supermarket.
Local Authority waste collection crews or their appointed personnel will collect refuse and recyclables from the roadside typically at the front of your property. Collection from domestic premises generally continues to be the responsibility of the local council and several have employed the provision of bins in which to collect specific recyclable materials or products. The services do vary from council to council.
In the business and commercial market, waste materials management contractors offer separate storage containers where the customer deposits the applicable waste stream or recyclable materials ready for collection. The particular bins will usually be clearly labeled as to which recyclable materials need to be placed within that container or bin. Alternatively, the bins will be colour coded to identify which recyclable materials ought to be placed within which bins.
The key to a successful recycling initiative is informing the public about what can be recycled and how. In the commercial world getting the co-operation of factory employees is crucial. The introduction of any recycling scheme must ensure that in asking employees to separate waste for recycling, it does not become time consuming and affect the efficiency of what employees should be doing in their work.
The Recycling Process
Various collection systems exist for the collection of the recyclable products . Regardless of what collection method is employed , the resources are taken to a recycling centre where they’ll be segregated from other wastes. This may be done manually or through the use of mechanical separators.
To begin the recycling process from the collection point of view, the more recyclable material which can be segregated at source, i.e. at home or in the work place, the more useful it will be for the waste collector. For this reason separate containers are supplied to the waste producer to encourage segregation at source. If card can be collected using a truck, that will collect no other waste material, the card is going to be kept uncontaminated and as a consequence will have an increased value when it gets to the processing plant. Similarly, specialist glass collection vehicles are used to collect solely glass. Aside from the obvious health and safety reasons and the weight of collected glass, it’ll have a much higher value if the collected glass load is not contaminated with other waste material.
When collected, the recyclable materials may be taken direct to the reprocessing plant, if the load contains only that particular type of material. So a dedicated glass collection vehicle could take the load on to a glass processing plant. It is more likely that the glass will have to be bulked up for onward shipment to the processor.
If compounded recyclables are collected such as paper and card within the same container, it may be necessary for the collector to take the load to a drop off point to unload and allow the load to be segregated into separate paper and card bundles for onward transfer to a paper or card processing plant. Whatever technique is used, the recyclable material gathered will most likely be segregated or cleaned before going through to a reprocessing plant to be converted to a new resource and eventually used as a new product or in manufacturing.
There are many ways to generate green energy within the your own home and now one can find government schemes in the form of subsidies to encourage these initiatives.
The Increasing Importance of Recycling
In the UK around 35% of waste materials collected from households is recycled or composted. Whilst in the business and industrial area, the volume of waste material sent to landfill has dropped considerably recently and the amount of waste now being diverted for recycling or reuse by this market has risen over the volumes going to landfill. But there is still much to be done to increase rates even more within this sector.
Landfill continues to play a vital role in the management of waste across the UK as not all waste items can be recycled and some are more suited to landfill disposal than by any other method. However, it’s not just the increasing expense of getting rid of waste directly in landfill that is making recycling a more appealing option for businesses. Landfill is becoming scarce, with several authorities suggesting that the quantity of space available across all UK landfill sites, has less than ten years existence remaining before all sites are considered to be full.
In the past few years, waste management firms have had to change their focal point, and start to take into consideration and spend money on technology, like energy from waste facilities, anaerobic digestion facilities and mechanised biological treatment plants, as alternatives to landfill. Local Authorities have adapted their attitudes by undertaking detailed strategic reviews as to how waste materials under their jurisdiction should be taken care of. In some cases this means unitary authorities are progressing plans to introduce long-term deals, usually around 25 years in length, through which to handle their entire waste materials management demands. These agreements will most likely include the need to develop a facility through which to take care of all waste created throughout the city by sorting all waste materials streams. The deals might also include the collection of waste and recyclables from households across the area. So the face of waste management is evolving quickly. The days of simply throwing anything in the dustbin have gone and the arrival of new technologies are upon us. The introduction of new technologies will play a huge role in the future of waste management.
Conclusion
Recycling has become a way of life and is not going anywhere soon. It has evolved over the years from something which was undertaken with no real thought behind it. The trusty rag and bone man was just trying to make a living. Today, many blue chip organisations are setting out plans for a ‘zero to landfill’ waste plan, where the intention is very clear – reduce waste, reuse waste and recycle waste, but no waste must end up in landfill.
Many households across the country now have some form of bin in which to separate waste materials for recycling. The decision to split up newspapers, aluminium cans and plastic bottles are almost common place. Whilst in industrial and business sectors, there is an increasing list of items to think about for recycling like printer cartridges, office paper, metal and electrical equipment.
Ideally the entire process would be a complete cycle such as it was in the time of the horse. However the advent of new technology will accelerate further the way in which our waste is to be managed in the future, but it is highly unlikely that we will ever reach the ultimate waste free society.