CRN supports paper recycling plans for kerbside sorting

The Community Recycling Network welcomes plans by the paper industry to dissuade local authorities collecting paper mixed with dry recyclables. Councils that collect comingled materials from the kerbside for sorting at large MRFs have been given three years by the Paper Federation to introduce separated collection, in a report entitled Implications for Future Paper Recovery Schemes.

In the CRN’s view, there has never been a place for big MRFs. The trend in kerbside collections as practised by its members is taking the UK away from large MRFs as a solution.

“The dinosaur-sized MRFs which take mixed domestic recyclables are currently heading for extinction,” says Andy Moore, CRN’s coordinator. “Many large MRFs end up consigning large percentages of perfectly recyclable material to landfill. This is due largely to the poor quality of input material and unrealistic expectations about how such material can be sorted mechanically or by hand at speed.

“Community sector MRFs, dealing with specific parts of the waste stream sorted by the householder, achieve average reject rates of four per cent of input material.

“Material quality demand, particularly for paper, was always likely to be the downfall of the big MRF. This guide by the Paper Federation and others leaves those involved in paper recovery and recycling in no doubt as to the quality required and the experience of the consumers of various grades of incoming feedstock by origin and handling. Draft proposals say that the kerbside collection of paper mixed with other dry recyclables and then sorted at a clean MRF is an ‘unacceptable practice’ that has to be phased out. The CRN agrees and applauds this move by the recovered paper industry.”

Following the release of the guide large waste management companies have made predictions calling large-scale segregation impractical and prohibitively expensive. “This is uninformed rubbish,” says Andy Moore. “Waste paper can be collected at the kerbside in quantities which will meet local authority targets. Indeed, the community sector has been collecting significant percentages for local authorities for years.”

ENDS

Notes for editors:

The Community Recycling Network is the umbrella organisation for more than 300 community groups, co-operatives and not-for-profit businesses in the community waste sector. Its aim is to promote community-based recycling as the most effective way of tackling the UK’s growing waste problem. Its members have achieved some of the highest recycling rates in the UK and offer separated kerbside recycling collections to 1.5 million households – six per cent of the UK population.

For further information:

Andy Nelmes, CRN press officer, (0117) 907 4368, andyn@crn.org.uk

Community Recycling Network, Trelawny House, Surrey Street, Bristol, BS2 8PS, tel: (0117) 942 0142. www.crn.org.uk.

tol, BS2 8PS, tel: (0117) 942 0142. www.crn.org.uk.