Over 100 tonnes of glass waste was sent to recycling over the summer in an East Yorkshire town. Figures unveiled by East Riding of Yorkshire Council during June, July and August show that residents in Pocklington have begun to use bottle banks in the region in order to adapt a more environmentally friendly lifestyle. The best performing site for collections was located in Sainsbury’s car park, weighing in at 43 tonnes of glass waste recycled. The Old Station parking structure in Stamford Bridge and then Tesco’s outlet in Market Weighton followed Sainsbury’s car park. The Tesco collection bin took in 20 tonnes ... Full Story

Repak’s Recycling Week will kick-off on Monday by targeting recycling in the workplace in an attempt to encourage more workers to divert waste from landfill while on the job. According to the packaging recycle group, more than 20 kilos of packaging waste were recycled each second in Ireland last year. The results were announced at Repak’s launch for its recycle week initiative and place Ireland in no. 8 for packaging recycling rates out of the EU member states. Dr Andrew Hetherington, CEO of Repak said that last year each household in Ireland recycled on average 144 kilos of cans, boxes, bottles and ... Full Story

The Campaign to Protect Rural England (CPRE) are promoting a new initiative aimed at increasing recycling rates for tins, plastic containers and bottles. Anti-litter campaigners have said the new scheme would utilise deposits to achieve a 90 per cent return rate on recyclable materials like glass bottles, plastic containers and tin cans, in a programme that proponents claim would be largely self-funding. CPRE said today that mandating a refundable deposit on plastic and glass bottles would give consumers more incentive to reduce litter and recycle more. Under the proposal, the environmental pressure group has said that any consumers purchasing containers smaller than ... Full Story

De Bortoli Wines, which imports and distributes wines throughout the UK, has been slapped with a fine of over £8,300 from the Environment Agency. After failing to comply with the Agency's waste packaging regulations, the wine company pled guilty to failing to recover, recycle and register its packaging waste. According to the Environment Agency, the firm, based in Farnham, had failed to provide the required certificate of compliance leading to the fine, which includes costs - £2,128 - and compensation - £1,686. UK manager for the wine importer, John Thorne said that the firm readily accepted their error and had paid the ... Full Story

Recycle Glass Week has kicked off in the US as the Glass Packaging Institute (GPI) and Keep America Beautiful Inc team up for community-drive initiatives. With events being held across the country from 12 September to 18 September, the GPI-sponsored event will coincide with Keep America Beautiful's nationally recognized America Recycles Day. With a day to celebrate recycling coupled with a series of community-based initiatives, the event hopes to promote the importance of glass bottle and other glass products being recycled. According to Joseph Cattaneo, president of GPI, the firm is delighted to be organising community recycling drives across the country. Furthermore, ... Full Story

European Plastics Recyclers (EuPR) are speaking out against a new Swiss report that states that sending PET bottles to landfill is a better option than recycling. SRI Consulting’s ‘PET’s Carbon Footprint: To Recycle or Not to Recycle” suggests that the carbon footprint generated by recycling PET bottles is greater than sending them to landfill. The report concludes based on evidence from the production of raw material down to the secondary packaging of PET bottles that recycling is not the ‘greener’ option for the item. However, Casper van den Dungen, chairmen of EuPR’s PET working group, scoffed at the report, saying that the ... Full Story

In a Jersey car park in St Aubin, numerous recycling bins will be installed in  an effort to increase on-the-go recycling for local residents. Beginning Friday, islanders will be able to deposit recyclable items in the form of cans, paper, plastic and glass bottles directly into the new recycling banks being setup in the back of St Aubin’s parish hall. The facility will increase the number of recycling sites on the island to a total of 15. The bid comes in a move to reduce the growing number of fly-tipping incidents with glass bottles. Additionally, the Parish of St Brelade has put ... Full Story

Westfield Shopping Centre announced today the launch of its new recycling initiative, which will see an expected 675 tonnes of beverage containers diverted from landfill per year. The scheme, which will be rolled out on a national level, could collect enough recyclable material to fill nine Olympic swimming pools per year. The Parliamentary Secretary for the NSW Minister for Climate Change and the Environment, Angela D’Amore MP was on hand to official kick-off the campaign at the Westfield mall in Burwood, NSW yesterday. According to Ms. D’Amore the coordinated recycling plan was a first for Australia and that it would significantly ... Full Story

The City of York Council said that it will resume its box deliveries for its kerbside recycling scheme for households that have not yet received them.Deliveries were placed on hold at the peak of the summer holiday season in order to avoid the risk of boxes being left outside houses while families were away on vacation. Over 30,000 households had already received the new boxes at the beginning of summer and the remainder – around 40,000 households – will all have the new boxes beginning 6 September. The new box scheme incorporates three containers, each designed to store specific recyclable materials ... Full Story

A new report from Swiss consulting firm SRI Consulting suggests that the yield from PET recycled bottles is 50 per cent or more, meaning that placing the bottles into landfill may lead to a lower carbon footprint. According to Eric Johnson, a research analyst at the Zurich-based consulting company, recycling is not the most efficient way to handle waste management of PET bottles. He added that firms needed to examine all the plastics collected. Author of the report PET’s Carbon Footprint: To Recycle or Not Recycle, Mr Johnson outlines the ... Full Story

Plastics recycling firm Closed Loop Recycling is planning to open a series of plants across Britain. The company, which produces food-grade rHDPE and rPET, has hired UBS bank to help raise £30 million in financing for its plans. Closed Loop Recycling already has a plant in Dagenham, Essex, which has been operating since 2008 and has been very successful. The company is now intent on building a second plant on Deeside. The Dagenham plant already produces 35,000 tonnes of plastic bottles from consumer waste every year. The new plant will bring total annual production capacity up to 85,000 tonnes. The combined ... Full Story

Thirsty residents in the south of England are being urged to take a ‘tap water test’ in a bid to cut down on waste created from bottled drinks. Councils across Dorset are urging people to go back to tap as part of a new drive to cut waste and save money and energy.   Recycling teams are heading out across the region where they are setting up stands and inviting residents to rediscover the taste ... Full Story