Westminster Council sends recycling thousands of miles away to India and Turkey

Recycled paper and metal in Westminster is being sent thousands of miles away to be turned into cardboard boxes and cans in Turkey and India.

Around 80 per cent of the recycling thrown out by residents and businesses in Westminster is processed in the UK.

The council’s head of city management Raj Mistry claimed the authority was hot on checking what happens to the 20 per cent of recycling it has to send abroad.

The council sends paper and cardboard to Kent, Spain and India where it is turned into cardboard packaging.

Glass bottles and jars go to Tilbury and get turned into new glass bottles, as well as jars and road surfacing. Steel cans, which make up two per cent of the recycling, go to Wales, Turkey and India to be turned into new cans, car parts and girders.

Aluminium cans are sent to Cheshire and Germany for processing into new drinks cans.

Raj Mistry’s council report said: “Around 80 per of the materials we collect are reprocessed within the UK.

“We are very conscious of media reports showing piles of so-called recycling from the UK and other western countries polluting countries in Africa and South-East Asia so checking the end-destination of where Westminster’s materials are sent remains a key priority and is regularly monitored.”

He said the council regularly lobbies the government to increase the UK’s  reprocessing capacity so that all recycling can be managed locally.

Plastic bottles are sent from Westminster’s doorstep collections to Veolia’s plastics recycling facility in Dagenham, ensuring Westminster’s plastic bottles are reprocessed as close to the source of the waste as practical.

The council also arranges host visits so residents can see the recycling plant in Southwark.

Plastic bottles are sent from Westminster’s doorstep collections to Veolia’s plastics recycling facility in Dagenham, ensuring Westminster’s plastic bottles are reprocessed as close to the source of the waste as practical.

The council also arranges host visits so residents can see the recycling plant in Southwark.

Between 2020 and 2021, 77 per cent of household waste Westminster was sent for incineration, 22 per cent for recycling and one per cent anaerobic digestion – giving the  council a recycling rate of 23 per cent.

As few residents have gardens producing green waste, the council sees lower rates than some other boroughs and areas elsewhere in the country.

It is looking at collecting  paper and card separately and only taking glass bottles from street bottle banks rather than from residents’ doorsteps.

Plastic accounts for eight per cent of Westminster’s recycling and gets sent to Dagenham and is turned into new plastic bottles, piping, fleece.

And the scraps of food and vegetable peelings people put out in their food caddies in the  trial of 7,500 homes goes to Bedfordshire and is turned into energy, fertiliser and soil improver.