The Essential of Recycling for the Future
Throughout history, recycling has existed in one guise or another. Even as long ago as 400 BC evidences of early recycling are recognized to have occurred. Archaeological reports show that ancient waste dumps contained less of what is known nowadays as household waste, including pots, utensils and ash, which demonstrates that individuals were, even in those days, keen to reuse products during a period when natural resources weren’t 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 may be argued how the old ‘rag-and-bone’ man was just an early recycler collectingdiscarded goods on his horse and cart, before reusing or transforming the accumulated items into new things. The 60′s TV series, Steptoe and Son, brought this very much to the public eye and greater attention.
During periods like the World War Years, recycling and re-use were common place as natural materials became considerably more difficult to get. Along with food being rationed, certain materials including metal and fibre werenormally permitted only for use by the government in support of military operations, to satisfy manufacturing requirements often in the production of weaponry. There was a desperate need to support the military.
Thanks to rising power costs, the need to recycle aluminium increased during the seventies.. As a material aluminium uses much less energy within the production process than many other materials. Plus it was much prized owing to its non rusting qualities. The demand for aluminium saw the emergence of scrap metal merchants who were willing to pay money in exchange for good quality metal. Also, in the seventies in areas of the USA, the first trucks were seen to be collecting waste with a separate trailer for the gathering of recyclable resources being towed behind the vehicle. This was mainly for big bulky objects like bedsteads and old carpets.
Into the late 1980′s, early 1990′s and as the awareness of managing the intercontinental environmental state increased amongst world-wide authorities, the debate upon recycling really started to gather energy. In the UK, the government imposed recycling targets upon Local Authorities along with the introduction of new legal guidelines upon the waste materials market, recycling schemes really began to take off. The once widely well known waste disposal businesses, began to call themselves waste management specialists and demonstrated through the offer of waste collection and recyclable material collection that waste needed to be managed more efficiently. Local skip companies needed to become better at what they did.
Today, many hundreds of materials and products are easily recycled, including paper, card, glass and plastics, to phones, electrical items, printer cartridges, textiles, clothing and concrete. The demand for different types of collection receptacles has increased dramatically.
What Exactly is Recycling?
The term recycling describes the process of converting used resources into new or nearly new materials avoiding the need for potentially useful materials or products to be thrown away. Essentially it is diverting waste material from landfill.
Recycling takes on an important role in a world where climate change is high on the environmental agenda. It removes the requirement to avoidably send waste material and products to landfill or other waste disposal options. Consequently this diminishes the need and the reliance upon consuming fresh or new natural materials, cuts back energy usage and air and water pollution, all of which contribute to lower greenhouse gas emissions. Significant contributions to improving the natural environment.
Recycling would probably be most evident through the recycling facilities now provided by local authorities for household refuse and recycling collections and also innovative waste management organisations who commonly offer a full range of waste and recycling collection services.
One of the most well know United Kingdom professional in waste products management is Biffa Waste Ltd, you can go to their website for more information on all aspects of waste and poisonous waste management.
Within the waste material market, the normal promotional activity is all around the waste hierarchy – ‘reduce, reuse, recycle and recover’. This 4 R slogan is a straightforward message designed for a far reaching audience. Consider some ways to lessen your waste materials. Could the waste material products or materials be reused? Can the waste product or material be recycled or retrieved?
The waste hierarchy is often a strategy which many waste material management organisations and local bodies look at when creating new waste management strategies. The system is designed to focus the thoughts around preventing waste being produced to start with. Consider the options for reuse and recycling but ultimately minimise the amount of waste produced at the end of the cycle.
So the emphasis is very much on the entire manufacturing process. The waste hierarchy expands much wider than to waste material management companies and local authorities. Working groups have already been established to bring many sectors together to consider the complete waste cycle. For instance, the producer of a product needs to consider how a product is to be constructed. Could parts be used which can later be recycled or reused? Could the quantity of packaging that surrounds the product be reduced? Once the product reaches the shop, is it necessary for the product to be located inside an outer package? If the retailer sells the merchandise, what will the consumer do with the unwanted components of the purchase, i.e. the packaging? How will the packaging be handled and where will it go? Does it go back to a recycling plant, for onward transfer to a reprocessing facility, in which the cycle starts 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 going direct to landfill. Since 1996, the United Kingdom government has enforced a landfill levy on all waste discarded within landfill. The rate of levy has increased considerably lately rising from the original 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 materials streams, although there is a lesser rate for inert products. Delivering waste materials straight to landfill is an expensive course of action and locating acceptable ways to divert waste out of landfill is now important.
Therefore, the message to everybody is clear, segregate your waste material to cut back the volume of waste materials going to landfill. Traditionally, both at home and at work, as soon as you place waste into the bin , it is forgotten about. Another person will collect it and take it away. Nowadays, in your own home and at work, recycling is being stimulated via the supply of containers in which to place certain recyclable materials.
Perhaps the most common resources to be seen being gathered for recycling are paper, card, glass, metals and plastics. But the possiblity to recycle a vast number of materials or products keep increasing. Although technically not seen as recycling, food waste and garden waste collections are increasing, where the food or garden waste material is taken back to a plant for processing into a reusable or saleable compost product.
Within sizeable organisations, a number of recycling schemes can easily be launched to collect used or unwanted recyclable substances.
The systems of collecting items or waste to be recycled is also escalating and becoming more noticeable within local communities. Dedicated collection sites, known as bring bank sites, are cropping up in supermarket car parks to inspire clientele of the supermarket to return such objects as bottles, newspapers or cardboard to the containers on their way into the supermarket.
Local Authority waste collection crews or their appointed contractors will collect refuse and recyclables from the roadside typically at the front of your property. Collection from domestic premises typically continues to be the responsibility of the local authorities and many have now employed the provision of baskets in which to gather particular recyclable materials or products.
In the industrial and commercial field, waste materials management businesses offer different containers in which the customer deposits the appropriate waste stream or recyclable materials ready for collection. The bins will usually be plainly tagged as to which recyclable product must be put within that container or bin. Otherwise, the bins will be colour coded to identify which recyclable wastes should 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 informing the public about what can be recycled and how. In the commercial world getting the co-operation of office 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 systems exist for the collection of the recyclable products . Regardless of what collection method is employed , the resources are taken to a materials recycling facility where they will be segregated from other wastes.
To start the recycling process from a collection viewpoint, the more recyclable material that can be separated at origin, i.e. at home or in the work place, the more useful it will be for the waste collector. For this reason separate containers are provided to the waste producer to stimulate separation at source. If card can be collected using a vehicle, that will collect no other waste material, the card will be kept uncontaminated and for that reason will have a higher value when it gets to the processing plant. Likewise, dedicated glass collection vehicles are used to collect solely glass. In addition to the obvious health and safety factors and the weight of collected glass, it’ll have a greater value if the collected glass load is not contaminated with other waste materials. Uncontaminated recyclables will present a much higher value than contaminated products.
When collected, the recyclable materials can be taken direct to a reprocessing plant, if the load contains only that specific type of material. So a dedicated glass collection truck could take the load on 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 compounded recyclables are being collected such as paper and card within the same compartment, it may be necessary for the collector to take the load to a recycling centre to unload and allow the load to be segregated into distinct paper and card bundles for onward transfer to a paper or card processing plant. No matter what approach is used, the recyclable material obtained will most likely be segregated or cleaned before traveling through to a reprocessing plant to be processed to a new resource and ultimately used as something new 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 around 35% of waste material collected from homes is recycled or composted. Whilst in the commercial and industrial community, the amount of waste material delivered to landfill has declined significantly recently plus the amount of waste material now being diverted for recycling or reuse by this sector has increased above the volumes going to landfill. But there is still much to be done to boost rates even more in this sector.
Landfill continues to play a significant role in the management of waste across the UK as not all waste items are able to be recycled and several are more suited to landfill disposal than by any other means. Nonetheless, it’s not just the increasing costs of getting rid of waste directly in landfill that is making recycling a far more attractive option for corporations. Landfill is starting to become scarce, with several experts hinting that the amount of void accessible across all UK landfill sites, has less than 10 years existence remaining before all sites are reckoned to be filled. Such countries as Dubai have filled parts of the coastline with their waste and created useful land area to extend the boundaries of their kingdom.
In recent times, waste material management companies have had to change their focus, and start to consider and put money into technology, like energy from waste facilities, anaerobic digestion plants and mechanical biological treatment plants, as alternate options to landfill. Local Authorities also have changed their views by undertaking detailed strategic reviews as to how waste materials under their jurisdiction must be taken care of. In some cases this has meant that unitary authorities are implementing plans to introduce extended agreements, usually around 25 years in length, through which to handle all of their waste materials management needs. These contracts will often include the need to build a facility through which to take care of all waste materials created across the region by sorting all waste streams. The contracts could also include the collection of waste and recyclables from homes across the area. So the face of waste management has been evolving rapidly. The days of merely throwing anything in the dustbin have disappeared and the advent of new technologies are upon us.
Conclusion
Recycling is now a way of life and is maturing all the time. It has evolved through the years from a thing that was carried out with no real thought behind it. The trusty rag and bone man was just working to make a living. Today, many blue chip companies are setting out plans for a ‘zero to landfill’ waste strategy, where the intention is very straightforward – reduce waste, reuse waste and recycle waste, but no waste must end up in landfill. Some companies have announced ambitious target dates by which to achieve such plans.
Many homes across the country now have some kind of container in which to divide waste for recycling. The need to separate newspapers, aluminium cans and plastic bottles are almost the norm. Whilst in industrial and business areas, there is an increasing selection of items to take into account for recycling like printer cartridges, office paper, metal and electrical equipment. Even on street corners and airports you see bins to recycle such items as newspapers and drink cans.
Ideally the whole 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 unlikely that we will ever reach the ultimate waste free society. There will always be a need for waste to be disposed of somewhere, somehow.
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