The Big Recycling Hunt

This week marks National Recycling week and this year’s theme, The Big Recycling Hunt, encourages a week of action which brings the nation together to recycle more of the right things, more often. The Big Recycling Hunt focuses on “missed capture”: recyclable items that are commonly missed in the home, including empty aerosols, food tins, plastic cleaning and toiletry bottles, pots, tubs an

Sustainability is at the core of local start up success story, origin, set up by a collective of staff, led by Ben Durack and his colleague Daniel Sutherland, and students from Gray’s School of Art who wanted to impact on plastic waste, reduce the carbon footprint associated to recycling and to challenge themselves with designing and developing products that would service the local community. 

Last year, origin set up Scotland’s first ‘one stop shop’ for plastic waste and now the company, with the support from Gray’s School of Art, has ambitions to build more origin hubs in highly visible public spaces around the world that will collect, recycle and transform local plastic waste into something useful.   

One of the main aims of origin is to educate the public and to encourage more people to recycle and to use products that are made locally. RG View caught up with origin Co-Director, Ben Durack, and Gray’s lecturer, to find out more about how we can all use less and recycle more.

1. What can people do in their everyday lives to recycle plastic more?

There is a lot of greenwashing and conflicting information in the media which can make it a real challenge to understand if something can actually be recycled. Just because something is recyclable, doesn’t mean it is actually recycled. Of the 6+ billion tonnes of plastic waste generated to date, only than 9% has been recycled. A few questions to consider before putting something in your recycling bin:

• Avoid single use plastics where possible. Single use plastics are estimated to account for nearly 50% of all plastics produced.
• Do I have to throw it out? Can it be re-used? Re-use is a really positive step in curbing plastic waste
• What kind of plastic am I throwing away? Can you find a recycling symbol? Does your local council publicise what plastics it accepts?
• Spread the word – we are all global citizens and can each take a small amount of responsibility

2. Do you think people need to think before they recycle?

Finding out what plastics your local recycling facilities will accept can be a challenge, with a lot of conflicting information. As a result, we often “wish-cycle”, hoping that by putting something into the recycling bin it will be recycled. Often, if there is too much un-recyclable material to sort at a recycling facility it can result in the whole lot being sent elsewhere (often to landfill or energy recovery).

There are a lot of green claims publicised which sadly don’t stack up. This greenwashing can make it challenging to find the facts and trust the information we are being provided. Always question any claim being made and do your own research where possible.

3. Are there any items that are a ‘no no’ for recycling?

For plastic waste, there are a few items to avoid putting in the recycling generally speaking:

• Plastic films/bags (these can clog the recycling machinery)
• Black plastics (black can evade a lot of the identifying equipment)
• Expanded polystyrene (i.e. foam trays or packaging)
• Composites (any plastic mixed with other materials like glass fibre)
• Most bioplastics (often these can be industrially composted but recycling isn’t well established for these plastics currently)

4. We’ve all got used to shopping on Amazon and other online retailers and expecting fast deliveries, but do you think people need to consider how their consumer habits?

I would encourage us all to be questioning our consumption habits a little more. Globally we currently consume 1.75 planets worth of resources to sustain ourselves. Clearly this isn’t sustainable and by individually questioning our consumption habits and making small changes, collectively we can create a big impact.

5. Plastics are often demonised in the media but is this fair? 

Plastics are largely demonised in the media with the continued appropriation of negative messages in relation to this material. However, not all plastics are bad. Invented in 1907, there is a reason why plastics have become so universally important to us. They are clean, adaptable and repeatable. Plastics save lives every day through the use of countless inspirational inventions that support our health and emergency services. Plastic, as a material, is not the problem. It is our use of this material that causes problems. Namely, single-use plastics and single-use products. This approach to consumption largely contributes to the biggest environmental challenge that we face as a global community

6. Are recycling systems in the UK working?

According to the big plastic count in 2022, only 12% of UK plastic waste is recycled in the UK, with a further 17% exported for recycling. There have been a number of articles over the years that have demonstrated that this plastic waste exported is in fact not recycled which leads to a lack of public trust. Even if plastic waste is recycled, it has to travel around the planet to be processed, remanufactured, warehoused and distributed to end consumers. At origin we don’t think this is good enough. This is why we started origin, a one stop shop for recycling plastic waste locally, in the public eye, creating sustainability you can see.

7. Sustainability forms a major thread throughout Gray’s curriculum, with students encouraged to consider this in all their practice. How do you incorporate sustainability into your teaching, and do you think students are more aware about how important this is?

Students at Gray’s are highly engaged with the sustainability agenda and this passion for the environment and effecting change was a large driver in starting origin.

8. Last year, Origin set up a pop-up ‘one stop shop’ in the Schoolhill area of Aberdeen city centre. How did this go and how did the public respond to the project?

This was origin’s first concept store in the city centre and was received very positively by the public. Footfall was high with a very engaged public that were energised by the prospect of a full scale origin hub. Not only was this met positively by the public but also by the business community, with many new connections made that are leading to new opportunities.

9. What can be done on a local level to support recycling?

If you live in Aberdeen and want to support a more localised approach to recycling waste plastic, origin will happily accept all clean polypropylene (recycling number 5) that is either white or colourful.

10. Why is the circular economy so important?

Put simply, we have 1 planet but we are using the resources of 1.75 planets. Our current consumption model of take-make-waste is not only unsustainable, it is highly wasteful and by closing the loop there is a huge opportunity to make use of this discarded resource.

Images show origin pop up shop in Aberdeen and Gray's lecturers and origin co-founders, Ben Durack & Dan Sutherland.

us you can communicate positive messages about circularity and responsible purchasing that will benefit and educate others.