Beverage ring carrier manufacturer Hi-Cone has become the first non-branded firm globally to partner with TerraCycle to recycle plastic ring carriers.
Terracycle works with companies to provide consumer free and easy recycling solution to move waste into a circular system.
From this, ring carriers can be given a new life, and be turned into items such as park benches, outdoor furniture and composite lumber.
According to the British Plastics Federation (BPF) ring carriers are collected and recycled by very few local authorities.
As a result, the two firms have decided to lead the effort to tailor recycling techniques to individual waste streams where specialist beverage packaging is concerned, ensuring that ring carriers can be collected and recycled, and have a new life after use.
The main purpose of the initiative is to educate and encourage consumers to recycle ring carriers through free channels.
Consumers can search online for their nearest collection point or can sign up as a private collector and download free-post labels to send their used ring carriers in for recycling.
Hi-Cone president Kenneth Escoe said: “We are extremely excited to be launching this new initiative with TerraCycle which means that our product is now fully recyclable in the UK. Moving forward, our goal is to recover and reuse as many plastic ring carriers as possible worldwide, and the TerraCycle partnership helps us to achieve that. Hi-Cone has long been dedicated to reducing its environmental impact and this latest project forms part of a broader strategy that will ensure ring carriers are 100% recyclable or compostable by 2025.
“It is vital that packaging producers take the lead in pushing sustainable programmes forward, and that is why we have stepped in at this stage of our own journey to champion this process with TerraCycle. We will be monitoring the progress of this initiative very closely as it rolls out in the UK, and will then assess the possibility of widening its scope further into Europe, the US and beyond.”
TerraCycle Europe general manager Laure Cucuron said: “To date, we have some 80 million people engaged in collecting waste materials across 21 countries and typically these programmes are funded by brands or municipalities. It is therefore very refreshing to have a packaging manufacturer such as Hi-Cone engaging with us and taking responsibility for the materials it sends into circulation. We have a shared responsibility to close the material loop and we would encourage more packaging producers to work with us and to follow the example Hi-Cone is setting.”
The new recycling scheme aims to create a UK-wide network of public access ring carrier recycling points.
Community groups and individual consumers are encouraged to set up locations for their communities where the public can drop off ring carriers post use, which can then be sent to TerraCycle for recycling.
Packaging 360 is a comprehensive knowledge sharing ecosystem for the Indian packaging industry. Our services include an online content platform to deliver news, insights and case studies; organising conferences seminars and customised training; Providing Bespoke Project Consulting, Market Research and Intelligence.
