Pride Of The Web –

Right through history, recycling has been around in some guise or another. Even as long ago as 400 BC evidences of earlier recycling are recognized to have occurred. Archaeological studies show that ancient waste dumps contained fewer of what is known today as household waste, like pots, tools and ash, which demonstrates that people were, even in those days, keen to reuse materials during a period when natural resources were not so freely available. Little did they know that the things they were starting would play such a huge role in shaping the world for future generations

Indeed it may be argued that the old ‘rag-and-bone’ man was just an early recycler collecting unwanted goods on his horse and cart, before reusing or transforming the recovered 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 a lot more difficult to find. In addition to food being rationed, certain materials like metal and fibre were largely allowed just for use by the government to support military operations, to satisfy manufacturing requirements often in the production of weaponry. There was a desperate need to support the military.

As a consequence of rising energy costs, the requirement to recycle aluminium increased in the seventies.. As a material aluminium uses a reduced amount of energy during the production process than some other materials. Plus it was much sought after as a result of its non rusting qualities. The need for aluminium saw the rise of scrap metal merchants who were prepared to pay cash in return for the best quality metal. In addition, in the seventies in regions of the USA, the first trucks were seen to be collecting waste with a separate trailer for the gathering of recyclable items being towed behind the vehicle.

Towards the late 1980′s, early 1990′s and as the awareness of handling the worldwide environmental state heightened amongst international governments, the debate upon recycling really started to gather energy. In the United Kingdom, the government imposed recycling targets upon Local Authorities along with the introduction of the new legal guidelines upon the waste materials industry, recycling programmes really began to take off. The once widely recognised waste disposal businesses, began to call themselves waste management specialists and demonstrated with the offer of waste collection and recyclable materials collection that waste needed to be managed more successfully.

Nowadays, many hundreds of materials and resources can be recycled, ranging from paper, card, glass and plastics, to mobile phones, electrical items, printer cartridges, textiles, clothing and concrete. The demand for different types of collection receptacles has increased dramatically.

What is Recycling?

The term recycling identifies the process of reprocessing second hand materials into new or nearly new products and avoid the need for potentially valuable materials or products to be dumped.

Recycling plays a key role in a world where climate change is high on the environmental agenda. It removes the need to avoidably send waste products and products to landfill or other waste disposal options. Consequently this reduces the need and the reliance upon consuming fresh or new natural materials, lowers energy use and air and rain 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 domestic refuse and recycling collections and by innovative waste management companies who commonly give a full range of waste and recycling collection services.

Some factories will generate dangerous waste, so visit www.biffa.co.uk and bring in the specialists to be confident of secure disposal and compliance with the law.

In the waste sector, the common promotional activity is all around the waste material hierarchy – ‘reduce, reuse, recycle and recover’. This 4 R slogan is a basic message designed for a far reaching crowd. Think about ways to reduce your waste. Can the waste products or materials be reused? Could the waste product or material be recycled or recovered?

The waste hierarchy is a strategy that many waste material management firms and local bodies consider when creating new waste management schemes. The system is intended to concentrate the mind around avoiding waste material being generated at all. Think about the options for reuse and recycling but ultimately minimise the amount of waste produced at the end of the cycle. The slogan has been adopted particularly well in the public sector.

So the emphasis is very much on the overall production process. The waste material hierarchy stretches much wider than to waste material management firms and local authorities. Working groups have been established to bring many sectors together to look at the whole waste cycle. By way of example, the producer of a product has to think about how the product will be designed. Could parts be used that can later be recycled or reused? Can the volume of packaging which surrounds the product be cut down? When the item reaches the store, is it required for the product to be placed within an outer box? Once the retailer sells the item, what will the purchaser do with the excess elements of the purchase, i.e. the packaging? How will the packaging be collected and where will it go? Does it go back to a recycling facility, for onward transfer to a reprocessing facility, where the cycle will begin all over again? The process must be simple to manage and implement.

How are Materials Collected for Recycling?

Legislation now dictates that most waste needs to be processed to divert the volume of recyclables and unnecessary waste material going direct to landfill. Since 1996, the UK government has enforced a landfill tax on all waste materials discarded within landfill. The rate of tax 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 announced that this will increase further to £48 per ton by the end of 2010/11. This rate applies to all general waste streams, although there’s a lesser rate for inert products. Sending waste materials straight to landfill is an expensive option and locating appropriate solutions to divert waste out of landfill has become a priority. For inert materials the rate is £2.50 per ton.

So, the message to everyone is clear, sort your waste to reduce the volume of waste going to landfill. Traditionally, at home or at work, the instant you place waste into the bin , it is forgotten about. Someone else will collect it and take it away. These days, in your own home and at work, recycling is being stimulated with the supply of containers in which to place certain recyclable materials. At home, the children are often the keen recyclers.

Perhaps the most common resources to be seen being recovered for recycling are paper, card, glass, metals and plastics. Even so the possiblity to recycle many materials or products keep increasing.

By way of training, consumers may be inspiried think ‘green energy’ so that they will engage in energy recovery operations and make better use of their level of waste.

The means of collecting items or waste materials to be recycled is also growing and ever more apparent within local communities. Dedicated collection sites, known as bring bank sites, are popping up in superstore car parks to motivate customers of the supermarket to return such objects as bottles, newspapers or card to the containers on their way into the store.

Local Authority waste collection crews or their appointed personnel will collect refuse and recyclables from the kerbside normally in front of your house. Collection from household premises normally remains the responsibility of the local authorities many have now employed the supply of bins in which to gather specified recyclable materials or products. The services do vary from council to council.

In the business and commercial field, waste management companies offer separate storage units in which the customer deposits the correct waste materials stream or recyclable resources ready for collection. The particular bins will usually be clearly branded as to which recyclable product ought to be put within that container or bin. Alternatively, the bins will probably be colour coded to distinguish which recyclable wastes ought to be placed within which bins. Waste management companies also may have to deal with special requests from the customer.

The true secret to a successful recycling initiative is educating 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 staff 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

Several collection solutions exist for the collection of the recyclable products . No matter which collection method is utilised , the resources are taken to a recycling centre where they will be segregated from other waste items. This could be done manually or by making use of mechanised separators.

To start the recycling process from a collection point of view, the more recyclable material which can be segregated at origin, i.e. at home or in the work place, the more efficient it will be for the waste collector. That’s the reason individual storage units are supplied to the waste producer to encourage separation at source. If card can be collected using a truck, which will collect no other waste materials, the card is going to be kept uncontaminated and as a consequence will have a greater value when it actually reaches the processing plant. In the same way, dedicated glass collection vehicles are widely-used to collect just 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 materials. Uncontaminated recyclables will present a much higher value than contaminated products.

Once collected, the recyclable materials are generally 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 directly 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 blended recyclables are collected such as paper and card within the same container, it could be necessary for the collector to take the load to a materials recycling facility to unload and allow the load to be sorted into distinct paper and card bundles for onward transfer to a paper or card processing plant. No matter what technique is employed, the recyclable material obtained will usually be segregated or washed before going through to a reprocessing facility to be converted to a new resource and ultimately used as a new product or in manufacturing.

Because of high density populations, the problem of waste disposal requires more innovative solutions than the old landfill ideas. power in waste is just one such solution, turning waste material into electricity.

The Increasing Importance of Recycling

In the UK close to 35% of waste materials collected from households is recycled or composted. Whilst within the commercial and industrial area, the volume of waste materials delivered to landfill has dropped significantly in recent years and the amount of waste material now being diverted for recycling or reuse by this market has risen above the quantities going to landfill.

Landfill continues to play a necessary role in the management of waste throughout the UK as not all waste products can be recycled plus some are more suited to landfill disposal than by any other method. Nonetheless, it is not just the increasing expense of disposing of waste directly in landfill which is making recycling a more appealing option for businesses. Landfill has started to become scarce, with several authorities suggesting that the amount of space available across all UK landfill sites, has under ten years existence remaining before all sites are reckoned to be filled.

In recent years, waste materials management firms have had to vary their focal point, and start to take into consideration and spend money on new technologies, like energy from waste facilities, anaerobic digestion plants and mechanised biological treatment plants, as alternatives to landfill. Local Authorities have also changed their attitudes by undertaking comprehensive strategic reviews as to how waste under their jurisdiction needs to be dealt with. In some cases this means unitary authorities are implementing plans to bring in extended deals, usually around 25 years in length, through which to control their waste management needs. These agreements will most likely include the need to build a facility through which to take care of all waste material created across the city by sorting all waste streams. The agreements could also incorporate the collection of waste and recyclables from homes throughout the region. So the issue of waste management is changing rapidly. The days of just throwing every little thing in the dustbin have disappeared and the arrival of new technologies are upon us.

Conclusion

Recycling is now a way of life and is maturing all the time. It has evolved over the years from something which was performed with no real thought behind it. The trusty rag and bone man was just trying to make a living. Today, many blue chip companies are setting out plans for a ‘zero to landfill’ waste policy, where the purpose is very clear – reduce waste, reuse waste and recycle waste, but no waste must finish up in landfill.

Many properties across the country now have some kind of container in which to isolate waste materials for recycling. The requirement to separate newspapers, aluminium cans and plastic bottles are almost common place. Whilst in industrial and commercial sectors, there is an increasing list of items to think about for recycling such as 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 technologies will increase further the way in which our waste is to be managed in the future, but it is highly improbable that we will ever reach the ultimate waste free society. There will always be a need for waste to be disposed of somewhere, somehow.

Sole F80 Treadmill

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