Vanden believes plastic weight records are skewed

Bulk industrial recyclers are being shortchanged on weighbridges, says Vanden Recycling, after growing numbers of clients visiting its new plant near Peterborough have increased their revenues.

Damien van Leuven, CEO of Vanden, said: “We opened our first UK plastic processing facility in Whittlesey earlier this year - as you would expect, we've since taken on a number of new clients. What has surprised us is that on switching their plastic recycling to us, around 50 per cent [of clients] have instantly experienced an uplift in revenue from this material stream.”

He believes false weight reporting is widespread across the UK plastic recycling industry, which is abnormally increasing PRN prices.

Van Leuven said: “Our advice to those seeking a sustainable recycling route for their scrap plastic is firstly to sort your plastics into separate grades. Stackable stillages make this a simple and compact option and doing so will instantly increase the material value over a mixed load.

“You should also receive certified weighbridge tickets and detailed packing lists for each trailer received by your recycling partner. That way you know the exact amount of waste you produce and can correlate this with the value. Half of Vanden’s customers has found that previous service providers were not accurately reporting weights resulting in lost revenue.”