Zero Waste

Interesting to hear about the family on Woman’s Hour and their experiment to achieve Zero Waste in the home. The barriers they are up against to make progress like what to do with the stuff that can’t be recycled and how to get the rest of the family on board with the idea of giving up favourite things which are likely to generate too much waste packaging, present an honest view of the challenges.

Meanwhile at BCR Global from the office point of view at least we have stopped any waste arising from our textiles recycling facility ending up in the waste stream and clogging up over-stretched and dwindling landfill. We manage this by sorting and grading all textiles and categorising them into any one of 200 grades to establish which proportion is high enough quality for reuse, which will serve for secondary reuse – mattress stuffing, industrial wipes – and which is suitable for incineration and can be converted via Waste 2 Energy.

I shall continue to listen with interest how the family deals with various materials around the home in the coming weeks.

Maxine Sault, BCR Global Textiles.