Tetra recycling plan hits Hants hitch

In a report written for Project Integra – Hampshire County Council’s co-ordinated waste group – Colin Rowland, the head of environmental services for Havant Borough Council, recommended rejecting Tetra Pak’s current proposal to provide waste collection facilities, because of “environmental and financial concerns”.

Tetra Pak environment manager Richard Hands told Packaging News last month that the firm was “working to have reprocessing in the UK” by the second half of 2008.

He said the company would also continue to roll out bring-bank facilities across the country over the coming year, and was looking to “increase the depth of its coverage” through a “significant shift” to kerbside collection.

“We’re already putting agreements in place with waste management companies,” he said.
But Rowland said that although facilities in the UK would “address some of the sustainability” issues, Tetra Pak’s offer raised a “disproportionate level of debate” for the volume of material it represented in the residual waste stream, which he said was around 0.67%.

The British Retail Consortium’s (BRC) proposed on-pack logo for recycling, which was published for consultation in November, placed drinks cartons in the bottom – not currently recycled – category, although this is still subject to review.

However, Tetra Pak is confident its packs will be categorised as ‘widely recycled’.

Tetra Pak also announced in December that it was working with 30 of London’s 33 boroughs to provide carton collection.

Tetra Pak is working with waste management firms Recresco and Grosvenor to separate used cartons from other waste collected from bring-banks and via kerbside schemes. The cartons are then collated at a single plant before being shipped to Sweden, where they are turned into plasterboard liner by building materials supplier Lafarge.