A Big Boost for the Circular Economy in the North-West

The UK’s first dedicated plastic recycling park

In recent years what was once hotly debated is denied only by a tiny minority: the clear global consensus is, to put it simply, that what’s bad for the environment is bad business. The arguments now tend to focus on what measures are acceptable, which are commercially viable and practically feasible and which are unrealistic. It is unquestionably a ‘good thing’ that all legitimate and credible businesses recognise their environmental obligations and acknowledge their importance. However, now that this is a ‘norm’, it is perhaps tempting for organisations to pay lip service to ‘green issues’ without making any real effort or investment.

With that in mind, it’s good to hear that Cheshire is soon to be home to the UK’s first dedicated plastic recycling park, thanks to developers Peel L&P Environmental’s £165 million project, which builds on existing plans for a plastic-to-hydrogen processing plant to create something far more ambitious at the Ellesmere Port Protos site: something that makes real the vision of a ‘Circular Economy’ – and makes it a driving force for clean future growth.

Much more than a plant, this truly radical venture is a ‘strategic energy and resource hub’ – and because it already has enthusiastic support from all quarters, it’s expected to bring together all the region’s recycling capabilities and technologies and concentrate them in one focused, state-of-the-art hub – around which the entire North-West circular economy will revolve. And of course, in the process, it will eliminate the self-defeating carbon emissions involved in transporting recyclables to numerous sites around the region.

Capable of processing some 367,500 tonnes of mixed recyclables and plastic a year, the park synergises a range of cutting-edge operations to ensure their output far exceeds the sum of their parts, from materials, plastic and polymer laminate recycling facilities to a plastic-to-hydrogen facility that refuels all the operation’s HGVs and more besides.

The plans already have consent and Peel are now in talks with prospective partners in the park’s construction: and so begins the North-West’ circular economy revolution.