New plastic waste recycling facility to be built in Wales

The first company in the UK capable of recycling waste plastic bottles back into useful food packaging material is investing nearly US$21,000,000 to open a new plant in North Wales.

Closed Loop Recycling opened its first plant in London this past June. Now, backed by private equity investment from the Foresight Group and backing from the Assembly Government, the company intends to open its second plant.

The new recycling plant, which will employ 50 people, will take an annual total of 50,000 tons of water, milk and other soft drink bottles and turn them into recycled raw material for new food and drink packaging.

Company managing director, Chris Dow said, “This plant will allow us to make a real impact to plastic recycling in North Wales and North West England and we are delighted to have such positive support from the Welsh Assembly Government. Until we started operations there was no facility to recycle plastic bottles back into plastic food packaging. Now that we provide that facility, the industry is beginning to view recycled plastic in a new light.”

According to a recent study, the total amount of plastic bottles entering the UK waste stream is approximately 525,000 tons a year – equivalent to an estimated 13 billion bottles.

In 2007, the study found that 4.5 billion bottles were being recycled, with an estimated eight billion being exported or sent to landfills.