There must be something we can do with all the recycled materials now piling up in the country?
A dramatic drop in the prices paid on international markets means that Irish waste companies have rather a lot of material which they are currently storing, presumably with more arriving every day.
(Image: enviro-solutions.com)
The cost of storing all this waste presumably means that companies will need an even better price if they are to recover their costs. Hence the suggestion that waste collection charges would have to go up.
But surely, since these are useful materials, there is something creative we can do with them? Some new businesses that could be started?
Suggestions on a postcard please to the Environment Minister’s new action group, which has been given until mid-November to come up with some options.
has anyone looked at what the stuff for recycling is, its statistics, composition etc? what do recyclers abroad do with it? Could we not recycle it into something useful, and generate employment doing so? Or is it totally dependent on cheap labour generating low added-value material?
Roy,
the situation a year ago, as I understand it, was that as the recession bit, worldwide demand for cardboard boxes & packaging fell dramatically, driving down demand for waste paper (from which cardboard is made). I’m not sure what the current situation is, but much of our general recycling waste was shipped (as ballast) to China for sorting /re-use, from ships that would otherwise return empty having dropped off their cargo of ‘made in China’ goods. With consumption down, I guess the fleet is smaller and likewise demand for ballast . . .
I suggested converting the waste paper into a sustainable form of insulation, to the recent Irish ideas campaign run by Aileen O’Toole, but it didn’t make the shortlist! Perhaps it is naive of me to think that waste companies have already explored this option, and that the economics still don’t add up?
Mary