Kevin Weir at the new large plastics recycling system at the Te Maunga Transfer Station.
When a new grinding machine first came to Tauranga a few weeks ago, there were 50,000 wheelie bins in the North Island waiting for new life.
But the machine at Te Maunga Transfer Station, believed to be the first of its kind in New Zealand, is set to make shortwork of the bins.
The grinding machine was designed to handle large plastic waste. It can grind large items into 40mm pieces that can be melted down into recycled resin - it can grind up to 900kg of plastic chips in an hour.
This resin can then be returned to wheelie bin manufacturers and made into more wheelie bins.
A local sustainability leader says the machine will help conserve non-renewable resources, and the council says it replaces the "timely, difficult and expensive" process for breaking down large plastics.
Waste NZ's lower North Island recycling manager Kevin Weir said the machine was a "nice, easy, efficient way" of dealing with large plastics, particularly wheelie bins.
He said transfer stations used to be able to keep up with the number of wheelie bins needing to be recycled, but in recent times they were "becoming more common".
In September 2020, rates-funded kerbside waste collections was introduced for all households from 2021. Previously, private companies provided bins to thousands of Tauranga households.
Kevin Weir, Waste Management NZ's lower north island recycling manager, with Te Maunga's new grinding machine. Photo / Andrew Warner
"We got to a stage of a lot of bins coming to the end of their life and being returned. They [transfer stations] couldn't handle them so easily," Weir said.
He said there were 50,000 wheelie bins waiting to be processed in the North Island when the machine first arrived.
Without a grinding machine of sufficient size, workers had to cut the bins down manually with sabre saws and skill saws.
Weir said this was "unsafe" and "time-consuming".
"So we thought, 'what can we do to help?' And to make sure that we can actually properly recycle in a cyclic economy.
"The traditional linear economy where you 'take-make-dispose' is not something we promote. We don't like putting anything in landfills."
The machine can also handle other large plastics such as pallets and drums.
Weir said the machine was currently processing 3000 wheelie bins per week, mostly from Tauranga but also from around the country.
Weir said the machine was designed and built to make it easy and safe to operate.
Tauranga City Council's sustainability and waste manager Sam Fellows said the new recycling machine "eliminates" the "timely, difficult and expensive" process of cutting down large plastics by hand.
Tauranga city council's sustainability and waste manager Sam Fellows. Photo / George Novak
"Waste Management will be able to process the old wheelie bins currently stored at Te Maunga first, before extending processing to other large plastic items."
He said the council was "looking towards a future where less resources are sent to landfill".
"Reusing or recycling means one less thing getting buried underground.
"We are always encouraged by how passionate the community is about recycling."
Sustainable Bay of Plenty chief executive Glen Crowther said recycling large plastics could help conserve natural resources.
"You're saving all that oil, the non-renewable resource from making fresh plastic.
"If we have the facilities to actually do as much we can, then it means we can repurpose a lot of that resource.
"If it's going into landfill, it's just such a waste of energy that goes into these products. But also, there's just the potential to create a whole lot of waste in the natural environment."
Glen Crowther, executive director of Sustainable BOP. Photo / Talia Parker
He said the advantage of upgrading the recycling system "is that if people use it, you can take things that could otherwise end up damaging wildlife or create other problems and actually turn them into a resource".
However, he said the ideal situation for the environment was to reuse where possible.
"The number one priority is to use few resources, but given that we're all living in a consumer society and we buy things where we don't have any choice about the packaging ... We just need to have a good quality recycling system that is accessible for everyone."
He urged people to think about how they disposed of their waste without being "careless", and to try and only buy plastics 1, 2, and 5, which can be recycled.
"If the facilities are there like they are now in Tauranga, it's up to all of us to just use them as much as possible."
