Coffee Cups Recycling in SM1

Coffee cup recycling in SM1 is a new initiative that was been rolled out because of the rise of the number of coffee shops that opened in SM1. SM1 is 5.1 square metres and caters for approximately 6 coffee shops, inevitably coffee cups are found in a lot of places. With 4 coffee shops in SM1, Costa Coffee cups are currently the biggest issue we must deal with.

Disposable coffee cups can be found in offices, universities, colleges, hospitals, shopping centres, hotels, building sites, train stations etc meaning all type of commercial facilities in SM1 should be looking into implementing coffee cup recycling programmes.

In SM1 the biggest challenge with recycling coffee cups is the amount we are generate daily add to that the fact that they are paper cups but coated in either plastic or wax meaning they cannot be recycled at standard recycling plants. The plastics stop them from breaking down into pulp, stopping the paper being recycled. The items that are thrown away with coffee cups also make the recycling process harder, both napkins and stirrers mixed in with the cups add another layer to the recycling process.

Out of the three facilities in the United Kingdom that can recycle coffee cups we have access to one of them, so using our coffee cup recycling services in SM1 can be a huge benefit to you and the performance of waste recycling in SM1 as a whole.

In a year how many coffee cups are recycled in SM1?

There are 6 coffee shops in SM1 that sell 230 cups of coffee a day on average. These figures mean that daily 1,366 disposable coffee cups are disposed of. With a recycling rate of 0.25% 1,363 disposable coffee cups are being sent to landfill a day.

This is a problem as coffee cups:
• Are being littered; about half a million coffee cups are thrown onto our environment every day in the UK.
• Take over 30 years to decompose due to the plastic coating
• Create microplastics when they decompose
• Are made from wood and considering it can take up to 100,000 trees a year to facilitate the demand of the UK takeaway coffee habit this is a problem that needed addressing

However, there is some good news. With environmental awareness increasing in SM1 and positive actions taken from authorities and waste companies this has meant that recycling rates are rising. The recycling rate has gone from 1 in 400 to 1 in 25 recently mainly because 115 local authorities now collect paper cups and almost 30 waste collection companies have got involved in helping recycle coffee cups.

However, there is still more work to do in SM1, will you be part of the change?

1. In SM1 we supply businesses with specialist recycling sacks for recycling coffee cups

2. If stacked inside one another 250 cups is the capacity of each sack

3. ‘Milk round’ style collections are used in SM1 to collect the coffee cups, maximising our fleet utilization, therefore reducing of our carbon footprint

4. The collected cups are stored at a warehouse in London

5. Once there are enough coffee cups stored, they will be transported to James Cropper PLC (Burnside Mill) for the coffee cup recycling process to begin

6. The recycling process removes all excess liquid and then turns the cups into paper and plastic products contributing to the circular economy