Consumer brand Nestlé’s UK & Ireland arm has invested £1.65 million in Scotland-based firm, Yes Recycling, which aims to process hard-to-recycle plastics from its site in Fife.
The multi-million pound plastic recycling plant will turn flexible plastics not typically collected by local authorities at curbside into building materials. At the facility, items such as food packaging and sweets wrappers will be turned into plywood-alternatives for use in construction, retail spaces and the agricultural industry.
Nestlé is Yes Recycling’s first investor, doing so in the form of a pre-investment managed by compliance scheme Ecosurety. More specifically, the investment is via a forward sale of ‘Packaging Recovery Notes’ (PRNs) that will be supplied to Nestlé after the plastic recycling plant starts operating at the end of 2021.
Group packaging manager at Nestlé UK & Ireland, Alison Bramfitt, said: “We are working hard at Nestlé to create circularity for our packaging so it can have multiple lives and uses and doesn’t end up as waste in landfill.
“Being able to partner with pioneering technology such as this is just one of the ways we are taking steps forward on this journey.”
She added: “We have committed to make 100% of our packaging recyclable or reusable by 2025 and to reduce our use of virgin plastics by one-third in the same period. It is fantastic to see our packaging given a second life into something useful, and we are looking at many partnerships to help encourage the recycling infrastructure in the UK.”
Omer Kutluoglu, owner of Yes Recycling, commented: “Supporting domestic recycling and developing innovative solutions for complex plastics is a necessity for the environment and the economy.
“Yes Recycling recognises the work that Nestlé is doing to reduce packaging and create recyclable alternatives. Packaging presented as difficult to recycle will be recycled through our new facility in Fife. The project enables change for the better and Nestlé are at the forefront of facilitating these changes.”
Packaging, such as KitKat wrappers, Purina pet food pouches, Rowntree confectionery sharing bags and Nestlé Cereal bags will be taken from curbside material collected by Dunfermline-based Cireco, as well as some commercial streams.
It will then be transported to the Yes Recycling plant where it will be washed and sorted, then broken down and turned into pellets. Finally, these pellets are compressed to form the new plastic sheet, called Ecosheet, which can be used and eventually recycled again.
Read more about hard-to-recycle plastics recycling in retail on Green Retail World
[Image credit: Green Retail World]
