All the way through history, recycling has existed in one form or another. Even as long ago as 400 BC signs of earlier recycling are recognized to have occurred. Archaeological reports show that historical waste dumps contained less of what’s known today as household waste, like pots, utensils and ash, which shows that individuals were, even back then, keen to reuse products at a time when natural resources weren’t so freely available. Little did they know that the things they were starting would play such a huge role in shaping the world for future generations
Indeed it may be argued that the old ‘rag-and-bone’ man was just an early recycler collecting unwanted goods on his horse and cart, before reusing or converting 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 such as the World War Years, recycling and re-use were essential as natural materials became a lot more difficult to find. Along with food being rationed, certain materials including metal and fibre were largely permitted only for use by the government to support military operations, to meet manufacturing requirements often in the production of weaponry.
Because of rising power costs, the need to recycle aluminium increased during the 1970′s.. As a material aluminium utilises much less energy during the production process than alternative materials. Plus it was much sought-after because of its non rusting qualities. The demand for aluminium saw the emergence of scrap metal dealers who were prepared to pay good money in exchange for the best quality metal. Additionally, in the seventies in parts of the USA, the first vans 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 substantial bulky items such as bedsteads and old carpets.
To the late eighties, early nineties and as the importance of managing the intercontinental environmental state heightened amongst global authorities, the attention upon recycling really started to get momentum. In the UK, the authorities imposed recycling targets upon Local Authorities and with the introduction of fresh new legal guidelines upon the waste product market, recycling schemes really began to take off. The once commonly knownwaste disposal businesses, began to call themselves waste management firms and demonstrated with the offer of waste collection and recyclable materials collection that waste needed to be managed more effectively. Local skip companies needed to become better at what they did.
Currently, many hundreds of materials and products may be recycled, ranging from paper, card, glass and plastics, to mobile phones, electrical items, printer cartridges, textiles, clothing and concrete.
What is Recycling?
The word recycling identifies the operation of reprocessing second-hand resources into new or nearly new products avoiding the need for potentially valuable materials or products to be discarded. Essentially it is diverting waste away from landfill.
Recycling plays a vital role in a modern world where climate change is high on the green agenda. It removes the need to unnecessarily send waste material and products to landfill or other waste disposal options. This in turn diminishes the need or the reliance upon consuming fresh or new raw materials, cuts back energy usage and air and rain water pollution, that all contribute to lower greenhouse gas emissions.
Recycling would probably be most evident through the recycling assistance now provided by local authorities for household refuse and recycling collections and by innovative waste management firms who generally offer a full range of waste and recycling collection services.
Some factories will release into the water hazardous waste, so visit www.biffa.co.uk and bring in the specialists to be confident of secure disposal and compliance with the law.
In the waste material sector, the common promotional activity surrounds the waste materials hierarchy – ‘reduce, reuse, recycle and recover’. This four R slogan is a simple message designed for a far reaching target audience. Consider ways to eliminate waste. Could the waste products or materials be reused? Could the waste product or material be recycled or retrieved?
The waste material hierarchy is a strategy which various waste material management firms and local bodies look at when creating new waste management approaches. The system is designed to concentrate the thoughts around preventing waste material being produced to start with. Think about the options for reuse and recycling but ultimately minimise the amount of waste produced at the end of the cycle. The slogan has been adopted particularly well in the public sector.
And so the emphasis is very much on the overall manufacturing process. The waste materials hierarchy stretches much wider than to waste management businesses and local authorities. Working groups have been established to bring many industries together to consider the entire waste cycle. By way of example, the manufacturer of a product has to think about the way the product will be designed. Could parts be used which could later be recycled or reused? Could the volume of packaging which often surrounds the item be reduced? When the item reaches the store, is it necessary for the product to be placed inside an outer box? If the retailer sells the item, what will the purchaser do with the unwanted elements of the acquisition, i.e. the packaging? How will the packaging be collected and where will it go? Will it go back to a recycling plant, for onward transfer to a reprocessing facility, where the cycle begins all over again? The process must be simple to manage and implement.
How are Materials Collected for Recycling?
Legislation now dictates that all waste material needs to be treated to reduce the quantity of recyclables and unnecessary waste materials going direct to landfill. Since 1996, the United Kingdom government has enforced a landfill tax on all waste materials dumped within landfill. The rate of tax 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 declared that this will increase further to £48 per ton from the end of 2010/11. This rate applies to all general waste streams, although there’s a reduced rate for inert materials. Delivering waste material directly to landfill is an expensive choice and selecting acceptable solutions to divert waste out of landfill has become important. For inert materials the rate is £2.50 per ton.
So, the message to everyone is obvious, segregate your waste material to reduce the volume of waste materials going to landfill. Ordinarily, both at home and at work, as soon as you place waste into the container , it is forgotten about. Somebody else will collect it and take it away. These days, at home and at work, recycling is being stimulated by the provision of bins in which to place certain recyclable materials.
Some common resources to be seen being collected for recycling are paper, card, glass, metals and plastics. However the possiblity to recycle many 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 materials is taken back to a plant for processing into a reusable or saleable compost product.
By way of training, people can be inspiried think ‘green energy’ so that they will engage in energy recovery techniques and make better use of their waste.
The systems of collecting materials or waste to be recycled is also escalating and becoming more noticeable within local communities. Dedicated collection sites, often referred to as bring bank sites, are springing up in superstore car parks to motivate customers of the superstore to return such items as bottles, newspapers or cardboard to the containers on their way into the store.
Local Authority waste material collection crews or their appointed contractors will collect refuse and recyclables from the roadside usually at the front of your home. Collection from household premises normally remains the duty of the local authorities many have now employed the provision of boxes in which to collect particular recyclable materials or products. The services do vary from council to council.
In the business and commercial market, waste management companies offer separate containers where the customer deposits the applicable waste materials stream or recyclable material ready for collection. The particular containers will usually be plainly branded as to which recyclable product must be put within that container or bin. Otherwise, the bins will be colour coded to distinguish which recyclable materials ought to be placed within which bins. Waste management companies also may have to deal with special requests from the customer.
The real key 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 employees to separate waste for recycling, it does not become time consuming and affect the effectiveness of what employees should be doing in their work.
The Recycling Process
Several collection solutions exist for the collection of the recyclable products . No matter which collection method is employed , the resources are taken to a recycling centre where they’ll be segregated from other waste items.
To start the recycling process from the collection perspective, the more recyclable materials that can be separated at origin, i.e. at home or in the workplace, the more useful it will be for the waste collector. For this reason separate storage units are provided to the waste producer to encourage separation at source. If card can be collected on a truck, which will collect no other waste materials, the card will be kept uncontaminated and for that reason will have an increased value when it reaches the processing plant. Similarly, specialist glass collection vehicles are used to collect solely glass. Aside from the obvious health and safety reasons and the weight of collected glass, it will have a much higher value if the collected glass load is not contaminated with other waste material. Uncontaminated recyclables will present a much higher value than contaminated materials.
When collected, the recyclable resources are generally taken direct to the reprocessing plant, if the load contains only that specific type of material. So a separate 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 mixed recyclables have been collected such as paper and card within the same container, it may be required for the collector to take the load to a drop off point to unload and allow the load to be sorted into distinct paper and card bundles for onward transfer to a paper or card processing plant. No matter which method is used, the recyclable material collected will most likely be segregated or cleaned before proceeding through to a reprocessing facility to be processed to a new useful resource and eventually 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 Significance of Recycling
In the UK around 35% of waste collected from homes is recycled or composted. Whilst in the business and industrial community, the quantity of waste material sent to landfill has declined considerably recently and also the amount of waste now being diverted for recycling or reuse by this market has increased above the volumes going to landfill.
Landfill continues to play a necessary role in the control of waste throughout the UK as not all waste products can be recycled plus some are more suited to landfill disposal than by any other method. Nevertheless, it’s not just the increasing costs of disposing of waste directly in landfill that is making recycling a far more attractive option for corporations. Landfill is now scarce, with certain experts hinting that the quantity of space available across all UK landfill sites, has less than ten years existence left before all sites are deemed 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 state.
In recent times, waste management firms have had to change their focal point, and begin to consider and put money into new technologies, such as energy from waste facilities, anaerobic digestion plants and mechanised biological treatment plants, as alternatives to landfill. Local Authorities have changed their attitudes by undertaking detailed strategic reviews as to how waste under their jurisdiction must be handled. In some instances this means unitary authorities are implementing plans to introduce long term contracts, usually around two-and-a-half decades long, through which to handle their entire waste material management requirements. These deals will most likely include the need to build a facility through which to take care of all waste generated across the region by segregating all waste material streams. The contracts may also incorporate the collection of all waste and recyclables from homes throughout the region. So the face of waste management has been evolving quickly. The days of simply throwing every little thing in the dustbin have disappeared and the development of new technologies are upon us. The introduction of new technologies will play a huge role in the future of waste management.
Conclusion
Recycling is now a lifestyle and is here to stay. It has evolved over the years from a thing that was carried out with no real thought behind it. The trusty rag and bone man was just trying 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 end up in landfill.
Many homes across the country now have some kind of container in which to separate waste materials for recycling. The need to split up newspapers, aluminium cans and plastic bottles are almost the norm. Whilst in industrial and business sectors, there is an increasing selection of items to think about for recycling such as 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 entire process would be a complete cycle such as it was in the days of the horse. However the advent of new technology 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.