With over 75% of litter items collected on Australian beaches being plastic, anyone can see that this isn’t good for the environment. It’s projected that by 2050 there will be more plastic waste in our oceans than marine life. So what can be done about it?
This week Australian company Newtecpoly announced a crowdfunding campaing to raise $200,000 to expand its revolutionary plastics recycling machine called a PolyWaste Mixer Melter.
Unlike most existing plastics recycling processes, the PolyWaste system does not require plastics to be pre-sorted or heavily cleaned which means more plastic can be processed more quickly with waste dramatically reduced.
“We are currently really excited about the production of school yard furniture [and] we’ve even produced a park bench that’s now located in Noosa made exclusively from plastic debris collected from the beach” said Peter Barker, CEO of Newtecpoly.
The recycled plastic can be used to produce a range of products such as posts, bollards, planks, shipping pallets and potentially, even low-cost housing materials.
The operating costs of the melter are cheaper and its carbon footprint is less than 50% when compared to traditional methods, making it a highly competitive zero waste option for the recycling industry in Australia and overseas.
“The value in our technology is recycling what other technologies can’t, and shifting community perceptions by helping people take their own trash and turn it into something valuable” said Colin Barker, Technical and Administrative Director of Newtecpoly.
The funds raised by the campaign will help Newtecpoly, the only licensee to the new PolyWaste technology, improve the efficiency of its process.
“In order to make a significant and positive impact on the environment, we need our moulding process to be able to keep up with the awesome capability of our new melter” said Peter Barker.
Newtecpoly are also the manufacturers of eWood® garden beds, fencing and flooring which is made from 95% recycled materials including the printer cartridges collected through ‘Cartridges 4 Planet Ark’.
The issue of plastic rubbish will continue to be in the spotlight and recycling innovations like these have never been more important. Would you rather sea waste or see treasure?
Positive Actions
- Back Newtecpoly’s ‘Sea Trash to See Treasure’ crowdfunding campaign.
- Recycle used printer cartridges through ‘Cartridges 4 Planet Ark’ so they can be made into other products.
- Visit RecyclingNearYou.com.au to find out which plastics can be recycled through kerbside collections and about drop off recycling options.
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Sources
- Tangaroa Blue
- World Economic Forum report The New Plastics Economy
- Plastics News
- Industry Update
- Newtecpoly