North Yorkshire firm ReWorked has teamed up with national retailer Wilko to launch the 海角视频 high street’s first face mask recycling scheme.
The initiative will see special recycling bins going into 150 Wilko stores – 13 of them in Yorkshire – from April 1 on a three-month trial.
The move comes after ReWorked – which has facilities in South Milford, Goole and Hull – developed a full-service operation to process PPE, including disposable face masks.
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The firm, which specialises in harder to handle materials which it then turns into everything from sustainable building materials to furniture, has already set-up schemes to recycle PPE for customers and staff in various business settings.
Testing has also begun to salvage face masks for NHS and medical sites.
The tie-in with Wilko will see customers invited to recycle their disposable face masks in dedicated single-use collection boxes designed with health and safety in mind.
The box, collection bag and contents will then all be fully recycled.
The Yorkshire stores currently earmarked to take part in the trial are Armley, Barnsley, Brighouse, Castleford, Clifton Moor, Crossgates, Crystal Peaks, Huddersfield, Hull, Leeds Trinity, Parkgate Rotherham, Scarborough and Sheffield.
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Wilko is launching its recycling scheme because of environmental concerns around discarded face masks. An estimated 129bn are being used globally every month and scientific research suggests there are now more disposable face masks in the world's oceans than jellyfish.
Izzie Glazzard, marketing manager at ReWorked, said: "It's brilliant to be working with Wilko to tackle such an important and current issue. Their drive to provide this innovative service to their customers has been admirable.
“The scheme tackles a waste issue nobody had even considered until recently. Initiatives like these can drastically reduce the amount of harmful plastic waste entering our streets, parks and oceans, affecting the health of our planet."
Full collection boxes will be sent to the Hull-based processing plant.
After a minimum 72-hour quarantine period, the PPE is washed and shredded into 5mm pieces before being mixed with other waste plastic to a specific recipe.
The shredded plastic mixture is then heated to 200C-plus and pressed into durable boards. The ReWorked team and design partners then create shop fitting, installation, furniture and construction projects from the recycled plastic boards.
ReWorked refers to the process as Reclaiming the Mask and is part of an ongoing #ReclaimTheMask campaign the company is running to encourage other businesses to take control and responsibility for the growing PPE waste issue.
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Jerome Saint Marc, chief executive at Wilko, said: "Showing we care isn't something we just do at Wilko, it's one of our core values. We're thrilled to partner with ReWorked to be the first on the high street to take positive action, recycling discarded face masks on behalf of our customers.
"The scheme is super simple for shoppers to safely recycle a product which is often unavoidably discarded as a result of us all taking steps to protect the health of everyone around us.
“What's more, it also means we're able to help hardworking families, local communities and other businesses by turning something that we're simply throwing away into a useful and sustainable product that can have a genuinely positive impact."
Wilko is not the first high street retailer that ReWorked has worked with. Last autumn it teamed up with health and beauty retailer Boots to recycle plastic cosmetic containers at in-store collection points.