Page 15 from: Recycling International May issue | 2021
tRends & updates
15recyclinginternational.com | May/June | 2021
re-gen WaSte announceS Multi Million
inveStMent in recycled productS
following plans for a £22 million (eur 26 million) ‘circular economy
resource park’ in northern ireland announced earlier this year, re-gen
Waste has committed a further £20 million in the local manufacture of
two innovative new recycled products.
Derived from local household waste, the advanced, absorbent paper is
currently undergoing R&D testing in association with Queen’s University,
Belfast. Both manufactured goods should be ready to bring to market in
2023. The new investment is expected to create 250 jobs in the Newry
area, deliver £20 millions of value to the Northern Ireland economy annu-
ally and provide a strong alternative to incineration and shipping recycla-
ble materials overseas.
MD Joseph Doherty says that small and medium sized enterprises in
Northern Ireland have been innovating and developing processes and
plant to move towards a circular economy in the last ten years. ‘This can’t
happen overnight but Northern Ireland is hitting its targets to become a
zero-waste society. In 2019-20, the region achieved a household waste
recycling and composting rate of 51.9%. This is a dramatic step forward in
our recycling rate, which continues to grow,’ Doherty states. ‘The volume
of household waste landfilled has decreased by 352 837 tonnes, down
from 561 173 tonnes in 2009-10 to 208 336 tonnes in 2019-20 and is con-
tinuing to fall rapidly year-on-year. According to DAERA’s Compositional
Study 2017, 55% of the residual waste is recyclable material, which we will
also extract for use in manufacturing these new products.’
Doherty adds: ‘New policy and legislative measures such as extended pro-
ducer responsibility, plastic tax and a deposit return scheme will dramati-
cally change the nature and volume of waste, post 2023. We are position-
ing our business to meet these new policies and are proud that the 23.1%
increase in our recycling rate has been achieved through private invest-
ment by SMEs in the waste sector to extract and recover recyclable and
compostable materials.’
fead aSSertS vital iMportance of battery recycling
expert panellists taking part in a webinar organised by
waste management association fead agreed that hav-
ing a strong battery value chain is of strategic value and
importance for europe.
The debate was staged in the wake of the European
Commission’s proposal to modernise end-of-life battery
regulations and involved FEAD president Peter Kurth, Jose
Rizo Martin of the European Commission’s Directorate-
General for the Environment, Alessandro Danesi (commer-
cial director at battery recycler S.E.VAL Group) and
Hartmut Stahl (researcher at the Oeko Institut).
Their conclusions included:
• More ambitious collection targets; to achieve the cor-
rect handling and disposal of batteries, higher collection
targets of up to 80% for all types of batteries are needed,
except for automotive batteries when collection targets of
100% should apply.
• Mandatory recycled content; the circular economy
requires a strong demand for recyclates, and in this regard
mandatory recycled content is crucial. FEAD believes all
types of batteries, not only portable ones, need higher lev-
els of recycled content in the production of new batteries.
• need for appropriate and rapid implementation tools;
FEAD is calling for an early determination of the methodol-
ogy to be used in the calculation and verification of recy-
cled content, data gathering for the calculation and verifi-
cation of recycling efficiency and for the recovery of mate-
rials.
‘The right framework conditions are needed for a function-
ing circular economy in the battery sector at European
level so that it can develop its full potential,’ says Kurth.
‘This includes practice-oriented targets for efficiency quo-
tas, ambitious minimum input quotas for recycling raw
materials for batteries, and ambitious collection targets
coupled with a practical deposit system for batteries. If the
framework conditions are right, battery recycling can be a
key project for Europe in the transition to a true circular
economy.’
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