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Bins and recycling


Johny London

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19 hours ago, Boater Sam said:

My friend now lives in a sheltered housing estate, 63 households. Absolutely no recycling, the whole lot goes into black bags for landfill because the cost of enforcing proper segregation and storage  is prohibitive.

 

I have seen glass recovery wagons tipping in council tips, they use the cullet to make roadways on the tip because there is no profitable market.

 

I think that's a key word. In places like Sweden, recycling doesn't need to be "enforced" because people think it's their social responsibility to recycle and consequently recycling rates are high. One of my pet peeves is opening the general rubbish bins to see that some of my neighbours don't give a f@ck and have just thrown all the cans and bottles from last night's party into the general rubbish bin rather than into the recycling bins which are literally 10ft away. Lazy c@nts! It makes me think that if we can't even separate our waste what chance do we have of tackling the bigger environmental issues? It's the same with litter - we like to blame the food manufacturers and the supermarkets but they're not the ones discarding their used packaging in the street or into our waterways.

 

I thought using cullet made it possible to use less energy in the glass furnace? According to this document it's possible to reduce energy consumption by 25% compared to using virgin materials, which also reduces C02 emissions.

 

http://www.wrap.org.uk/sites/files/wrap/Glass Update Market Situation Report Autumn 2008.pdf

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We are lucky to have both recycling and mixed waste bins on our mooring site, the absurd thing is that there is only one collection a week, with all bins ending up in the same single compartment dustcart...

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43 minutes ago, BWM said:

We are lucky to have both recycling and mixed waste bins on our mooring site, the absurd thing is that there is only one collection a week, with all bins ending up in the same single compartment dustcart...

It’s just possible that when the wagon weighs the skip, the weights are separated into general and recycling and the entire load then sorted again at the other end, thus getting round the problem of lazy sods dumping their recycling in the wrong skip. The stuff has to be weighed anyway so that the client pays the right amount of landfill tax.

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7 minutes ago, BruceinSanity said:

It’s just possible that when the wagon weighs the skip, the weights are separated into general and recycling and the entire load then sorted again at the other end, thus getting round the problem of lazy sods dumping their recycling in the wrong skip. The stuff has to be weighed anyway so that the client pays the right amount of landfill tax.

I don't know, but it is a front loading, single compartment wagon with the usual compactor. This can only mean that the separated recyclables and general waste are mixed together! 

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 04/08/2018 at 16:57, ditchcrawler said:

Bit on Radio 4 this morning, probably Saturday  Live about recycling and how automated it is, also about the black plastic waste that they can't recycle. 

'Twas the Today programme.

(How do I know? Saturday Live gets switched off before anyone has to endure its ghastly presenters).

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On 04/08/2018 at 16:57, ditchcrawler said:

, also about the black plastic waste that they can't recycle. 

I find the concept of not being able to recycle (as in reuse) black plastic very strange.   We have a firm in the county making Stokbord a sort of plastic chip board.  This is made  from recycled plastic off farms much of it being silage bags (which are commonly black).

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10 minutes ago, Jerra said:

I find the concept of not being able to recycle (as in reuse) black plastic very strange.   We have a firm in the county making Stokbord a sort of plastic chip board.  This is made  from recycled plastic off farms much of it being silage bags (which are commonly black).

This is not a problem with the black material per se but with the equipment that is used in the sorting process. It relies on light passing through the refuse. There may be different systems in use in your part of the world.

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3 minutes ago, philjw said:

This is not a problem with the black material per se but with the equipment that is used in the sorting process. 

Then is shouldn't be beyond the wit of man and modern technology to solve the problem rather than witter on as they have (for what seems like years) that it can't be done.

 

One simple solution would be to ask people to separate black from translucent.

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8 minutes ago, philjw said:

This is not a problem with the black material per se but with the equipment that is used in the sorting process. It relies on light passing through the refuse. There may be different systems in use in your part of the world.

In domestic recycling processes the waste is separated by machine. Not such a problem when dealing with commercial or industrial recycling streams as the materials will be supplied presorted.

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Separation of plastics for recycle is quite a technical subject so not easily summarised here. To reuse plastic you need to isolate the different types ie HDPE, LLDPE, polypropylene, pvc, pet etc etc. If its not separated to a reasonable purity then the only use is in 'low tech' applications like plastic wood etc which is then not recyclable. Today, a lot of the recycle plants use a Near Infra Red machine to sort the plastic. This device shines an NIR light though the sample and the computer tells you what plastic it is. Problem is, it doesnt work on black plastic. The black pigment absorbs all the light. Also the NIR machines struggle to get better than 85% purity which is not good enough for applications that replace the virgin plastic. The biggest problem is sorting the polyolefins (PO) (ie HDPE, LLDPE, Polyprop) which accounts for 75% of the plastic waste. There is a new company on the block which can now do this to 98%+ purity  with new technology and this technology is likely to spread so true 'circular economy' PO recycling can happen.

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On 03/08/2018 at 20:24, Jerra said:

Recycling seems to vary so much from area to area.  Our local "tip" recycling centre takes garden waste, rubble, cardboard, paper, hard plastic, soft plastic, small electrical appliances, fridges freezers, oil, car batteries, domestic batteries e.g. AA, fluorescent light bulbs, metal,  composite wood, solid wood and I think I might have missed some things.

 

However there are some daft rules - no 6 wheel vehicles, no double axle trailers and you can't walk in.  You can by arrangement get a permit for the 6 wheeler and the trailers.  I think they idea is that commercial enterprises are more likely to use the 6 wheeler/trailers or park outside and walk in with their stuff.

 

I have never worked out why businesses (who probably have the most to recycle) aren't allowed to.

Sadly you can't get a permit for a 6 wheeler, you can get a permit for a van , which aren't normally allowed.

 

The system for Cumbria was invented buy a chap on the yachting forums. It enabled the council to achieve its waste management target with ease, I believe he got a pat on the back.

 

Edited by rasputin
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10 minutes ago, rasputin said:

Sadly you can't get a permit for a 6 wheeler, you can get a permit for a van , which aren't normally allowed.

 

The system for Cumbria was invented buy a chap on the yachting forums. It enabled the council to achieve its waste management target with ease, I believe he got a pat on the back.

 

You are slightly misinformed.  You can get a permit for a 6 wheeler.  Interestingly the reason I was given for not allowing 6 wheelers was "it would cause congestion" which I find incredible.  If they mean congestion as in too many vehicles when I was turned away with my 6 wheeler I made 8 trips one after the other with a small car so the congestion was greater.  If they mean the "footprint" is too big the "footprint" was no bigger than my mates Land Rover 110 which is allowed in.

 

Cumbria's waste management target must be pretty poor as we appear to be 159th out of 350 with 44.5%

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21 minutes ago, Jerra said:

You are slightly misinformed.  You can get a permit for a 6 wheeler.  Interestingly the reason I was given for not allowing 6 wheelers was "it would cause congestion" which I find incredible.  If they mean congestion as in too many vehicles when I was turned away with my 6 wheeler I made 8 trips one after the other with a small car so the congestion was greater.  If they mean the "footprint" is too big the "footprint" was no bigger than my mates Land Rover 110 which is allowed in.

 

Cumbria's waste management target must be pretty poor as we appear to be 159th out of 350 with 44.5%

never allowed "Vehicles with more than 4 wheels (including twin-wheeled on rear axle)"

 

From here

https://permits.cumbriawaste.co.uk/apply-for-a-permit.html

 

sadly wasted a lot of time discusing the logic of it to a v nice man called Francess at the county council

 

Edited by rasputin
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6 minutes ago, rasputin said:

never allowed "Vehicles with more than 4 wheels (including twin-wheeled on rear axle)"

 

From here

https://permits.cumbriawaste.co.uk/apply-for-a-permit.html

 

sadly wasted a lot of time discusing the logic of it to a v nice man called Francess at the county council

 

Strange I got a permit when I had the 6 wheeler hence the fact I thought you were miss informed. (Obviously not for the time I first tried and quoted above).

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