(L-R): Business Secretary Vince Cable with Chris Dow, CEO of Closed Loop Recycling
Business Secretary Vince Cable has officially opened a new plastic milk bottle recycling line at Closed Loop Recycling’s processing plant in Dagenham, London.
Visiting the site yesterday (23 April), Cable viewed the new high-density polyethylene (HDPE) recycling line (part of Closed Loop’s £12 million expansion project), which processes milk bottles into food grade material for new food and drink packaging, thus saving an estimated 30,000 tonnes of carbon emissions in the process.
The plant originally had the capacity to process 35,000 tonnes of mixed plastic bottles, producing 11,000 tonnes of recycled polyethylene terephthalate (PET) and 6,000 tonnes of recycled HDPE per annum. However, the new line has increased capacity at the plant to 55,000 tonnes per annum and boosted Closed Loop’s work force by a quarter, which the firm says makes the company the ‘biggest recycler of milk bottles in the world’.
Further, it is claimed that the investment will make the processing plant the ‘most advanced plastics purification facility in the UK’.
The move has reportedly come to ‘to fully meet the demands of the dairy industry which increasingly requires higher levels of rHDPE in its milk bottles’.
‘Supporting the UK’s transition to a green economy’
Speaking after his visit, Cable said: “This new recycling line will create jobs and growth in a growing green industry. The significant investment in the Dagenham plant will also mean less of our plastic bottles being sent to landfill or exported for recycling. It is precisely the sort of project which can support the UK’s transition to a green economy.”
Cable said the firm was “a fantastic example of how the private investment sector has identified a ground breaking and sustainable green manufacturing technology”.
He added: “This type of success story will continue to provide confidence for future investment and underpin continued economic growth. Supporting robust green companies will lock in green prosperity for the long term and lock carbon out.”
Closed Loop Recycling’s Chief Executive Chris Dow also commented, saying: “Recycled milk and water bottles are a massive win for the circular economy. We discussed with the Secretary of State and his team how we can provide economic drivers to reprocess these valuable resources in the UK, rather than being exported abroad for recycling. We can then work to influence recycling behaviour across the supply chain, from consumers to brands, in order to increase collection rates.”
Dow also briefed the Secretary of State about Closed Loop’s joint initiative with food recyclers TEG, which sees the reprocessor utilise heat from the TEG anaerobic digestion (AD) facility at the East London Sustainable Industries Park to heat the wash lines for its recycled plastic.
Find out more about Closed Loop Recycling.
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