All the way through history, recycling has been around in one way or another. Even as long ago as 400 BC evidences of earlier recycling are known to have taken place. Archaeological reports show that historical waste dumps contained fewer of what’s known today as household waste, including pots, tools and ash, which shows that people were, even back then, keen to reuse products at a time when natural resources were not so freely available. Little did they know that what they were starting would play a huge role in shaping the world for future generations

Indeed it could be argued how the old ‘rag-and-bone’ man was just an early recycler collectingdiscarded goods on his horse and cart, before reusing or converting the accumulated items into something new.

During periods like the World War Years, recycling and re-use were crucial as natural materials became much more difficult to get. 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.

Thanks to rising energy costs, the requirement to recycle aluminium increased during the 1970′s.. As a material aluminium uses significantly less energy within the production process than alternative materials. Also it was much coveted due to its non rusting qualities. The need for aluminium saw the emergence of scrap metal merchants who were ready to pay good money in exchange for the best quality metal. Additionally, in the 70′s in regions of the USA, the first trucks were seen to be collecting waste with a separate trailer for the collection of recyclable materials being towed behind the vehicle.

To the late 1980′s, early 1990′s and as the awareness of handling the worldwide environmental state accelerated amongst international governing bodies, the focus upon recycling really began to collect energy. In the UK, the authorities imposed recycling targets upon Local Authorities and with the introduction of the fresh legislation upon the waste product community, recycling schemes really began to take off. The once commonly recognised waste disposal corporations, began to call themselves waste management specialists and demonstrated with the offer of waste collection and recyclable materials collection that waste had to be managed more effectively. Local skip companies needed to become better at what they did.

Nowadays, many hundreds of materials and resources are easily recycled, which range from paper, card, glass and plastics, to phones, electrical items, printer cartridges, textiles, clothing and concrete.

What Exactly is Recycling?

The word recycling identifies the process of reprocessing used items into new or nearly new products and avoid the need for potentially valuable materials or products to be discarded.

Recycling performs an important role in a modern world where climate change is high on the green agenda. It helps to reduce the requirement to avoidably send waste material and products to landfill or other waste disposal options. As a result this reduces the demand or the reliance upon the consumption of fresh or new natural materials, decreases energy use and air and water pollution, that all contribute to lower greenhouse gas emissions.

Recycling would probably be mostnoticeable through the recycling facilities now provided by local councils for household refuse and recycling collections and also contemporary waste management organisations who typically provide a full range of waste and recycling collection solutions. Some firms, that have traditionally focused primarily on the collection of recyclable materials, are increasing their service offering to collect general waste materials as well.

Being in a position to gather waste material and change it back to a very useful material is of great benefit to our communities especially in the longer term. For recycling providers click here for all your recycling requirements.

Within the waste materials industry, the normal advertising activity is all around the waste material hierarchy – ‘reduce, reuse, recycle and recover’. This four R slogan is a simple message designed for a far reaching crowd. Think about some ways to reduce your waste materials. Can the waste products or materials be reused? Could the waste product or material be recycled or retrieved?

The waste materials hierarchy is often a strategy which various waste material management organisations and local authorities think about when developing new waste management procedures. The strategy is intended to concentrate the intellect around preventing waste being produced at all. Consider the options for reuse and recycling but ultimately minimise the amount of waste produced at the end of the cycle.

And so the focus is very much on the entire production process. The waste hierarchy extends much wider than to waste management businesses and local bodies. Working groups have already been established to bring many sectors together to consider the entire waste cycle. By way of example, the manufacturer of a product needs to consider the way the product is to be manufactured. Can components be used that can eventually be recycled or reused? Can the amount of packaging that surrounds the product be decreased? When the product reaches the store, is it necessary for the product to be located inside an outer box? Once the retailer sells the product, what will the buyer do with the unwanted elements of the purchase, i.e. the packaging? How will the packaging be stored and where will it go? Should it go back to a recycling facility, for onward shipment to a reprocessing plant, where the cycle begins once again?

How are Materials Collected for Recycling?

Legislation now dictates that all waste needs to be treated to avoid the amount of recyclables and unnecessary waste materials heading direct to landfill. Since 1996, the United Kingdom government has enforced a landfill tax on all waste material discarded within landfill. The rate of tax has increased considerably in recent years 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 from the end of 2010/11. This charge applies to all general waste materials streams, although there’s a lower rate for inert products. Delivering waste straight to landfill is an expensive course of action and locating appropriate ways to divert waste away from landfill has become important.

Therefore, the message to everybody is crystal clear, sort your waste to scale back the volume of waste material going to landfill. In the past, at home or in the office, as soon as you place waste in the dustbin , it’s forgotten about. Another person will collect it and take it away. These days, in the home and at your workplace, recycling is being stimulated through the supply of containers in which to place certain recyclable materials. At home, the children are often the keen recyclers.

Some common materials to be seen being gathered for recycling are paper, card, glass, metals and plastics. But the opportunity to recycle many materials or products keeps growing. Although technically not seen as recycling, food waste and garden waste collections are increasing, where the food or garden waste is taken back to a plant for processing into a reusable or saleable compost product.

Many schools introduce paper recycling initiatives because it is a material that pupils take for granted, but can easily learn to recycle.

The methods of collecting resources or waste material to be recycled is also escalating and ever more noticeable within local communities. Specialist collection sites, known as bring bank sites, are popping up in superstore car parks to inspire clientele of the superstore to return such items as bottles, newspapers or card to the containers on their way into the supermarket. Shoppers are therefore encouraged to bring back their recyclables.

Local Authority waste collection crews or their appointed personnel will collect refuse and recyclables from the roadside typically in front of your home. Collection from domestic premises typically remains the responsibility of the local council and several have employed the provision of bins in which to gather specific recyclable materials or products.

In the business and commercial sector, waste material management companies offer standalone containers where the customer deposits the applicable waste stream or recyclable materials ready for collection. The containers will usually be clearly labeled as to which recyclable materials should be put inside that container or bin. Alternatively, the bins will be colour coded to identify which recyclable materials need to be placed within which bins.

The key 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 productivity of what employees should be doing in their work.

The Recycling Process

Various collection systems exist for the collection of the recyclable products . No matter which collection system is utilised , the resources are taken to a recycling centre where they will be segregated from other waste materials.

To begin the recycling process from the collection viewpoint, the more recyclable material that can be segregated at origin, i.e. at home or in the work place, the more effective it will be for the waste collector. That is why separate storage units are supplied to the waste producer to promote segregation at source. If card can be collected on a truck, that will collect no other waste material, the card will be kept uncontaminated and as a consequence could have a greater value when it gets to the processing plant. Likewise, specialist glass collection vehicles are used to collect only glass. Aside from the obvious health and safety reasons and the weight of collected glass, it’ll have a greater value if the collected glass load is not contaminated with other waste material.

Once collected, the recyclable materials can be taken direct to a reprocessing plant, if the load contains only that particular type of material. So a dedicated glass collection truck could take the load directly to a glass processing plant.

If compounded recyclables are collected such as paper and card within the same compartment, it could be a necessity for the collector to take the load to a recycling centre to unload and permit the load to be sorted into individual paper and card bundles for onward transfer to a paper or card processing plant. Whichever approach is used, the recyclable material collected will most likely be sorted or cleaned before going through to a reprocessing plant to be processed to a new resource and ultimately used as something new or in manufacturing. Inert materials can be a useful by product at landfill, for example shredded old tyres to aid grip on access roadways.

There can be different ways to generate green energy in the household and now one can find government schemes in the form of grants to support these initiatives.

The Increasing Significance of Recycling

In the UK around 35% of waste collected from homes is recycled or composted. Although in the business and industrial sector, the quantity of waste materials sent to landfill has declined considerably recently as well as the amount of waste material now being diverted for recycling or reuse by this market has increased above the volumes going to landfill.

Landfill continues to play a key role in the management of waste throughout the UK as not all waste products can be recycled and some are more suited to landfill disposal than by some other means. Nevertheless, it’s not just the increasing expense of getting rid of waste directly in landfill which is making recycling a more appealing option for corporations. Landfill is starting to become scarce, with some authorities suggesting that the quantity of space accessible across all UK landfill sites, has less than 10 years existence remaining before all sites are considered to be full. Such countries as Dubai have filled parts of the coastline with their waste and created useful land area to extend the boundaries of their country.

In recent times, waste material management companies have had to vary their focus, and start to consider and invest in new technologies, like energy from waste facilities, anaerobic digestion plants and mechanical biological treatment plants, as alternatives to landfill. Local Authorities have changed their attitudes by undertaking comprehensive strategic reviews as to how waste materials under their jurisdiction should be taken care of. In some instances this has meant that unitary authorities are implementing plans to bring in long-term deals, usually around 25 years long, through which to handle all of their waste material management demands. These deals will most likely include the need to build a facility through which to deal with all waste created across the city by segregating all waste streams. The contracts might also incorporate the collection of all waste and recyclables from households across the region. So the face of waste management is evolving rapidly. The times of merely throwing anything in the dustbin have disappeared and the advent of new technologies are upon us.

Conclusion

Recycling is now a lifestyle and is here to stay. It has evolved through the years from something which was performed without any real thought behind it. The trusty rag and bone man was just working to make a living. Today, many blue chip firms are setting out plans for a ‘zero to landfill’ waste strategy, where the intention is very clear – reduce waste, reuse waste and recycle waste, but no waste must wind up in landfill.

Many households across the country now have some form of container in which to keep separate waste materials for recycling. The need to separate newspapers, aluminium cans and plastic bottles are almost common place. Whilst in industrial and business sectors, there is an increasing selection of items to take into account for recycling like printer cartridges, office paper, metal and electrical equipment.

Ideally the whole process would be a complete cycle such as it was in the days of the horse. However the advent of new technologies 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.

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