35. How to recycle a coffee cup with Rob Tilsley from James Cropper

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James Piper: Hello. Welcome to Talking Rubbish, a weekly podcast delving deep into the world of recycling and discussing the truth behind snappy headlines and one sided stories. I'm James Piper, or author of the Rubbish book. And I'm joined by Royal Be Stanifforth, my Far From Rubbish friend. And we, are joined today by Rob Tillsley, our far from rubbish guest. Good morning. Robbie.

Robbie Staniforth: Morning.

Gen Z and millennials throwing away food before best before date according to Harvard study

James Piper: I was on BBC Bristol. Robbie, I know you're in South Africa so you wonn't have heard this, but I was on the radio the other day.

Robbie Staniforth: Yeah, we don't get BBC Bristol out here, unfortunately. Although I'm sure over the Internet I could be streaming it and keeping up with local news.

James Piper: Yeah, I should have let you know. So I was talking about food waste. This was such a weird story. There was a Harvard study that found that Gen Z and millennials were throwing away food before the best before date.

Robbie Staniforth: Why?

James Piper: I honestly don't really know. There was this whole thing about like how previous generations didn't have best before dates, so they just sort of sniffed everything and looked at everything and worked out whether it was off. But for some reason Gen Z in particular and millennials have kind of been looking at those as a safety thing. You know, they brought me on to talk about the fact that actually best before dates are a quality thing and used by dates are the safety thing. So it was just really interesting. Just going back to our episode nine where we talked about food waste and why cucumbers are wrapped in plastic. You know, it's so important we all get used to using our senses to decide whether food is off or not.

Robbie Staniforth: Okay. Wow. So you, I mean, presumably millions and millions of years of human evolution means that we can tell whether some milks off or something.

James Piper: Yeah. Do you know my favourite adage about milk is you never have to sniff it twice. If you've going back for the second sniff, it's fine.

Robbie Staniforth: Okay.

James Piper: You're gonna know.

Robbie Staniforth: okay, that's a good one. I didn't actually know that one. I'm gonna steal that.

Most crisp packets in the UK go off on a Saturday

James Piper: And do you want my favourite fact? We didn't get to on the radio. I was annoyed. We only had five minutes and I was like, I've got my favourite fact and I didn't get to roll it out. So this is a podcast exclusive.

Robbie Staniforth: You should have said it first thing. Come on. You know that. If it's your favourite, what is it?

James Piper: Most crisp packets in the UK go off on a Saturday.

Robbie Staniforth: Oh, yes, you've told me this before, like years ago. Why is it Again, I think it's.

James Piper: Because the production starts on a Sunday. Well, we not get Walkers in as, a, you know, there's an interview, I think, just for this, but I think their production starts on a Sunday and then that means that, like, the end of the production week is a Saturday. So they just put everything is going off on a Saturday.

Robbie Staniforth: Okay, well, so I'm sure people at home will be, grabbing their next bag of crisps and turning it over, checking the date and seeing if it's a Saturday and writing in on Discord U, to let us know that you're absolutely right or absolutely wrong.

James Piper: Well, I keep telling people this and then we keep testing it. There are definitely some brands that do not conform to this, but most do. And so it is quite a cool little trick. If you're like, you know, you've got a pack of walkers in front of you, I promise that will go off on a Saturday.

Robbie Staniforth: Okay, there we go. Very good.

Lisa Foring is the owner of a zero waste refill shop in Northern Ireland

James Piper: And we also had Lisa email in. So Lisa is the owner of a zero waste refill shop in Northern Ireland and she loves the podcast and she wanted it was helping her to learn all about recycling and general waste management, which, for someone who runs a zero waste refill shop, is going to be pretty important.

Robbie Staniforth: maybe they, like, put it on in the shop, you know, and we can be the background music.

Rob Tilsley: How about that?

Robbie Staniforth: From an idea?

James Piper: That'd be nice. Yeah. Lisa wr in with the name of the shop. We'll do a little jingle for you. That would great. She had just listened to episode 29, which was about the bin collections and recycling rates. And what I loved is she was like, I feel compelled to write in and tell them about my bins. And it's like, that's our vibe, right? People just ride in and telling us about their bins. That's great.

Robbie Staniforth: Yeah, absolutely. We love that.

James Piper: She said her general waste bin is collected every two weeks. The green bin, which takes garden and food waste, is also every two weeks, once a month, glass is collected along with those two bins. And on the alternate weeks, the blue recycling bin is collected, which includes drinks cartons, which does not seem to be the case across the board, as we have said. what was interesting is the council do spot checks on the bins and won't empty them if there's recycling in with the general waste.

Robbie Staniforth: Oh, what, so they won't collect your recycling or they won't collect your general waste if they can see that there's a recyclable pet bottle in there or Something.

James Piper: Yeah. She seems to be suggesting that if the general bin has recycling or food waste in they will not collect it.

Robbie Staniforth: It's quite a good motivation that leave you with a stink in general waste bin if you don't make sure that there's no recyclable stuff in there.

James Piper: And they put a sticker on it to make you feel really bad so all your neighbourss can see.

Robbie Staniforth: Whoa. Public shaming. I like that too.

James Piper: It's great isn't it?

Rob Tilsley: Yeah.

James Piper: So thank you Lisa Foring. I mean this was skirting the line of an edition and correction. I think it was probably an ED addition but you know it was a whole different bin system. So if you're listening to this and you think I've got an interesting bin system to talk to Robbie and Chseph about, let's add it in new feature.

Robbie Staniforth: We literally are ah all ears on.

James Piper: This oneitionss

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James Piper: and corrections.

Port Teddy collects chocolate tubs and makes bench out of them

So a coup. Couple of weeks ago, a few weeks ago we talked about Teddy and his collection of chocolate tubs. Remember the six year old Robbie had collected up all the chocolate street and celebrations.

Robbie Staniforth: Right, yeah, yeah I remember collecting them up and raising money for charity in the process of recycling these polypropylene tubs.

James Piper: Yes. There's an addition to his story because Teddy was given a bench made of his tubs.

Robbie Staniforth: Oh really?

James Piper: Yeah, it's really quite. It's an amazing bench because it's purple. Presumably they used a lot of the Which one's purple Qual Quality street isn't it heroes possibly as well. So yeah they used those to make a purple bench and it was just a really nice, nice addition to the story. Although I was wondering is that the best route for these tubs? As always I like to rain on this parade. I was just thinking is that the best use of the tubs because they are food contact polypropylene. So it did get me thinking what happens to these tubs because I would have thought they could be used again in other areas and I actually was asking rap about this because I was intrigued as to, as to what you could do with these tubs and I guess you could use them for things like shampoo bottles, you know where you've got like a darker shampoo bottle. You could use it for that sort of thing where you know you need to think about the packaging needs to be clean, ex food grade type plastic. there'd be an opportunity to do that but yeah it seems to be the case.

Robbie Staniforth: Picking holes in Port Teddy story, aren't you?

James Piper: I'm sorry, Teddy. But yes, apparently in most cases it will go into things like bins, cratee boxes, furniture, guttering pipes, stuff like that, and potentially even in the automotive sector. So, yeah, I think a lot of this, I think comes down to colour. you know, they're, they're using purple and red in these chocolate tubs and I know there's a bit of a call to how do we get those to be a clear plastic with like a label on rather than colour, because then they'd have way more uses in the recycled plastic sector. So again, it comes back to colour of plastic and how we go about reducing the different types of colours that are out there. Anotherition of correction actually was a discussion on Discord that we had last night. Just as a reminder, we have our Discord, which is a forum or discussion about, our podcast and about just the general world of recycling. To be honest, it sort of has taken on a bit of a life of its own. So if you want to get involved in any of those discussions, head on over to our Discord. The link is in our show notes.

Robbie: We said simpler recycling coming in for all businesses this year

We'd said in one of our episodes, Robbie, that's simpler recycling. It was the legislation episode. We were talking about simpler recycling coming in. We said it's coming in for all businesses this year. And actually I had someone message who definitely has experience in this. They seem to have multiple sites and they were saying, actually we're looking at some of the exemptions, so they have some potential exemptions for simpler recycling. So we just need to correct what we said there about, about it coming in for all businesses. So what's your understanding of this?

Robbie Staniforth: Yeah, so this is the technically, environmentally and economically practical, exemption basically. And, it means that waste management companies who can prove that it would just cost too much or lead to no environmental benefit if they can lay out and prove basically that it's better to collect a few of these things together rather than separately, that you don't need to actually separate the waste. So it is true that businesses should be doing this, but in certain instances, and I hope it's only used few and far between, businesses can continue to collect stuff up together if it's more practicable to do so. We really do hope though, that separate collection, particularly of things like food waste and that people start collecting food waste as many businesses don't at the moment, will lead to greater recycling rates.

James Piper: Yeah, this is frustrating, I think that, you know, because particularly where you've got a business with multiple sites, they're going to be tempted to use that, right? They're go going toa say, hey, look, I can't implement this in every store. You know, if you've got a supermarket, they'll just say, oh, well, it's not practical to do that across every store, when actually it probably is and probably should be done. So, yeah, I guess, well, let's get into this discussion with Roin. Maybe we can talk about some of these issues where you've got like multiple sites trying to do one single thing and how that, you know, how difficult that can be and I guess coffee cups are a good example of that. So let's get into that discussion. But, I think it's frustrating from my perspective.

Robbie Staniforth: Brilliant segue, James. Yeah, I can't wait to quiz Rob on how we get all of these coffee cups collected in a uniform way.

We'd like to thank our sponsor Eco Suretyty for supporting rubbish podcast

James Piper: We'd like to take a moment to thank our sponsor, Eco Suretyty, who are on a mission to rid the world of unnecessary packaging. They help brands navigate the tricky world of extended produce responsibility. But that is not all. They also collaborate on incredible recycling projects and consumer awareness campaigns, which is why they've offered to support our podcast. So if you're an organisation looking to make smarter packaging choices, check them out@ecourty.com. and just as a reminder, we've mentioned Discord already, but if you want to get onto our Discord, we've got like

00:10:00

James Piper: 120something people there now, which is amazing. So if you want to go onto our discord, the link is in our show notes. It's super simple to use. You just click the link, set up a profile and then you can start chatting with our recycling community. You can get hold of us on social media@rubbishpodcast. Our email is talking rubbishpodcastmail.com and everything we discussed today can be found in our show notes, including our link tree, which gives you a link to all of our, reports that we found on the topics that we're discussing.

James Cropper is one of the main coffee cup recycling organisations

Okay, so today we're joined by Rob Tilsley. Rob, you're, you worked for James Cropper, which we said last week is one of the main coffee cup recycling organisations. So we're going to get really into the detail of how cups are recycled and how you think we can improve their collection. But before we get into that, do you want to give us a brief introduction to yourself?

Rob Tilsley: Yeah, so I'm fibre specialist at James Cropper, so I've got responsibility for the fibre we use in the paper and packaging business. So that's everything from obviously the virgin fibre, pulp and right all the way through to then the post consumer coffee cups that like you say we recycle on site.

James Piper: Okay, great. And just a history of James Cropper, you know, because presumeably you do things other than coffee cups, you do other fibre.

Rob Tilsley: So James Cropper were actually established in 1845.

Robbie Staniforth: Wow.

Rob Tilsley: So we're in advanced materials and paper and packaging group. Obviously the coffee cupside of things is within paper and packaging. so we're actually a specialist paper mill with a recycling facility. And sometimes people do get confused, they think we're a waste site and we're not, we're a paper mill. But we, we obviously developed a way to recycle ah, the coffee cup. So we're making very much premium paper and packaging products. You know we're a global business so it's obviously one of the things that we do is cut recycling and that enable us to put recycled coffee cups in products into many of the markets that we service.

James Piper: Okay, great. So you were around long before coffee cups had ever been thought about, long before Hugh was driving around in his bus.

Rob Tilsley: Yes, yeah, I've been with a business 20 years now in a variety of roles. So yeah, the past couple of years I've been in this role. So obviously it was interesting when, when obviously Hugh was having his crusade against the likes of Costa and McDonald's we were actually working with those people on how to recycle the cooks that they use. So in the background we knew that they were actually doing more than most to recycle those cups.

James Piper: We felt and you know I'm trying to cast my mind back because I was in the industry then but to be honest it was a long time ago, you know, Hughes in the bus in what, 2017 I think we said and I remember kind of seeing the cost of guys the next day or that night and it being like right, what are we going to do to get our of disposables? What are we going to do to recycle what we've got and but your view is they were doing a lot before that even happened.

Rob Tilsley: So once we developed the recycling plant and had that in place, we started with the off cuts from cup production. So in effect that's the same product that and cups are made from it obviously it's just not post consumer, so it's post industrial. But obviously our goal eventually was to always get the post consumer cups back to James Cropper for recycling. So we were working with those kind of people and obviously how we would do that.

James: How does the coffee cup recycling process work at TN I

Robbie Staniforth: Okay, so got into the coffee cup recycling from the like off cuts and thinking this is production waste that we should really be doing something with. It's perfectly uniform, which is exactly what you want as a recycler, isn't it? And it really easy to use but. But what was the thing that made you take the, the step and what happened and led to the kind of scale up? And also how does it work compared to the rest of the paper mill? Is it like a separate process? Just describe the process a little bit.

Rob Tilsley: Like I say, we make premium paper products. So the traditional waste roots for us are quite challenging and can contaminate our process and obviously cause lots of problems. So we needed to find a source of waste that was suitable for us. How? The people in our TN I team identified cook material as a source that could be viable because it's used in food packaging. So there's no contaminants in there, there's no brightening agents that can impact colour. They wear a coor mill. And so we recognised that then the challenge was, well, how do we get the plastic from the fibre? Because obviously we can't have plastic in our system. So I'm gonna make it sound like it was really easy but we developed a way to do that and then we invested quite a lot of money in putting the plant on site. So it's on site in the Lake District with the rest of the mill, but obviously is on sort of the

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Rob Tilsley: edge of production because obviously the fibre has to go to the paper machine so it has to be quite close to those. But basically we, using chemistry and water, we actually developed a way that through pull pin we can allow the product to be pullped for a period of time. And then actually what happens is the plastic separates from the fibre. So the plastic then gets removed from the process and the fibre goes through various cleaning stages, and then into storage towers that then feed the paper machines for if products have cup cycling fibre in.

James Piper: And we described it as just the same as a normal cardboard pulping process which we talked about before on the podcast, but just taking a bit longer. Is that, is that fair?

Rob Tilsley: yes. I'm.

Robbie Staniforth: No, it sounds like it's a bit more complicated than that James, by the look on Rob's face.

Rob Tilsley: Yeah, so it is, it is a pulping process. U. but in effect because we're removing the plastic, it is different. So we're using chemistry and obviously the temperature to remove that plastic and then We've got to remove the plastic from the process. So.

James Piper: Okay, so is the chemistry breaking the plastic away from the paper and then you're sort of sieving it out essentially?

Rob Tilsley: Yeah. So they, between the temperature of the water, the chemistry and the agitation of the pulpper that allows the plastic to separate and then the plastic flows to the top and gets removed.

James Piper: Got it. Okay, that's great.

A lot of people are pulping cups but not removing the plastic

And how many facilities in the uk, I think we said last week that we thought there were four facilities that do coffee cup recycling in the uk. Is that still the case?

Rob Tilsley: Yeah, that's, that's right. I guess like I say, we're slightly different in, in that way're removing the plastic. A lot of people are pulping the cups but not removing the plastic, so to speak. It then becomes part of the product that, that is then made out of it.

James Piper: Ah, okay.

Robbie Staniforth: And when you say the premium product, does that mean if it's part of the product, they aren't as premium products that they're using because it's got bits of plastic in it. How does that work?

Rob Tilsley: Yeah, so we like I say we're a premium paper mill. So the products we're making, so we're working with, you know, luxury brands or a lot of our end users, so we can't risk any contamination. Whereas actually there's a lot of products that are being, you know, facilities where they can get away with a bit of plastic in there, you know, if it's a more commodity type box board product, so the lower grade material you can get away with a lot more contamination, which means they can take a lot more waste.

Robbie Staniforth: Can you give us an example of that where you could get away with it, so to speak. Like are you talking like cereal boxes? What kinds of things?

Rob Tilsley: So yeah, your cardboard, brown type board, obviously the end use of those is, you know, it's for packaging purposes. It needs to be fit for purpose. Doesn't have to actually look fine. If it's been over printed as well then, then you can get away with a bit more contamination than, than what we can.

James Piper: So it'll be like speckled, you know, those kind of bits that are in there that I can imagine when I think about like a naturally coloured board, you know.

Rob Tilsley: And that was, that was part of our challenge, you know, when we launched the recycling plan, very much the market still wanted recycled products to look clean and almost like they were made from virgin fibre. We have actually seen a shift with that in that some, some brands do like it to look recycled. So which is which is good.

How many facilities do we need to recycle all those coffee cups

James Piper: Okay. So. And sorry, just to go back, you said you're a colour mill and I made a note of like, what is a colour mill?

Rob Tilsley: So in effect we one of, one of, you know, we pride ourselves. We have our own colour, lab on site. So what we will do is obviously a brand or a customer will ll have a product that they want to launch, but they'll want it in their own colour. So we will, we will then match that colour and then make paper, of that colour. So we have, you know, we have, a team of people in our lab that they're, you know, they're colour experts and you know, we get matches for weird and wonderful things all the time and that, you know, the guys are up against it sometimes to match a colour, but they find a way to do it.

James Piper: Okay, so this is like when I just painted a wall in my house. Didn't know what the colour was because I d recently bought it. So I chipped off a bit of the wall and took it to B Q and they colour matched it for a paint. That's the, that's the vibe. That's what we are.

Rob Tilsley: The paper mill equivalent of that.

James Piper: Yeah, you, are the paper mill. B Q fascinated. O I'm glad I asked. That's really interesting. I didn't know you did that.

Robbie Staniforth: That's amazing.

James Piper: Okay, great. And let's imagine a world where every paper cup was collected. So we're collecting 100% of paper cups, which is obviously a, different world to where we are today. M and we'll come on to that.

Rob Tilsley: Yeah.

James Piper: How many facilities do we need to recycle all those coffee cups, like the four that we've got. We are we there? And actually they're massively underc capacity. Or is it like. Actually we need 50 of those?

Rob Tilsley: I would imagine, I think, there was a bit of work done recently. and around the. The problem in the UK was three and a half billion books.

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Rob Tilsley: So that's the UK aloneeah. and we, we estimate that we could recycle 750 million of those. You could argue between the other facilities. Have we got enough in the uk.

James Piper: Maybe, but it's going to be close. That would be everyone at full capacity. So. So you know that those four facilities actually might be more like six to eight. And we could recycle every coffee cup. Okay, that's really interesting. I mean, that's good to know, isn't it, that we're not, we're not a million miles off and where we need to be. Okay, great. And so does that mean you're running. Look, without wishing to get into the commercial sensitivity of it, does that mean you're running significantly underc capacity because you're not collecting 750 million or does it not matter?

Rob Tilsley: So that's, that's right. We from a cup side of things, we're obviously not taking anywhere near that and we are running the, the cup trim so the offuts from the cut production still as well, which is in effect the same product. So we're removing the plastic and, and the fibres going on. But we, we do have more capacity. We actually the, the plant itself. So at the start of 2024 we put it on 247 running.

James Piper: Okay.

Rob Tilsley: And the feeling was obviously we with mandatory cup take back things like that they would provide opportunities to get more cups to us. and then it didn't happen. But we, we are still seeing, you know we are seeing growth in the number of cooks that, that come to us and that's you know with the likes of Viololia, Bifa, ah, Ricora and then schemes like the Cook Collective as well. And you know we're seeing a growth. One of the challenges is you know pre Covid we got quite a lot of momentum and then obviously with COVID things changed, consumer habits have changed, you know, so obviously McDonald's, all the fast food outlets are now doing deliveries to people's homes. All those cooks used to be collected in stores. You know people maybe still aren't travelling as much so there's still a long way to go. But yeah, we are, we are seeing through various schemes, you know, growth year on year since COVID getting cups back to us for recycling.

James Piper: Do you know that's so interesting. We didn't talk about home deliveries last week but that's such a, such a good point that people are more likely or yeah more likely now than pre Covid obviously to potentially have a delivery at home of a cup and they don't have a collection point at home. So it's a, it's a really good point.

Are we seeing any councils moving the direction of collecting coffee cups

Are we seeing any councils moving the direction of collecting coffee cups? Is that something you expect to happen or is that, are we not anywhere near that?

Rob Tilsley: I don't think so at the moment. I know there's, there is a, through the national Cook recycling scheme there and cup round. So there's, there's the box scheme. So in effect you can, you can get a box and fill that box and send it back and then that will be resycled with us.

James Piper: So you could do that at a household? Never. I could order a box.

Rob Tilsley: I think so, yeah.

James Piper: Okay.

Rob Tilsley: Yeah. So. And the cut round box is actually made at our mill using recycled coffee cup material as well. So. So that's like a closed loop solution there.

The cancellation of mandatory cup takeack scheme is a shame for ePR

Robbie Staniforth: And you touched there a little bit on the cancellation of this mandatory cup takeack scheme. So am I right in assuming that that is a shame for you as a business and you would have liked to have seen that come in.

Rob Tilsley: It is a shame. What I would say is that because people were planning for it and had done a lot of work that a lot of scheme people have actually just carried on. and obviously within epr, that's an opportunity as well. So although the mandatory cup take back has been shelved, there are things still happening that should result in more cups being recycled.

Robbie Staniforth: And I presume that producers of these cups, you know, coffee shops, et cetera, are thinking if they can prove that the cups don't end up at people's homes in the household waste stream, that they can kind of get that netted off their EPR bill in some way, shape or form.

Rob Tilsley: Yeah.

So you mentioned the recycling rate. Let's talk about that

James Piper: So you mentioned the recycling rate. Let's talk about that. Because we talked about it in last week's episode. We said in the reporting they're sort of reporting a 2.8% recycling rate. But that as you've alluded to, they sort of say in the reports we were working up to this amazing 2.8% and then Covid happened and we've had a step backwards. That's the latest data I can find. You know, because people are just reporting the pre Covid data. What do you, you know, what is the recycling rate at the moment, in your opinion? Because you're saying it's increasing and going up. So that, that's really good to hear. It'd be good to get a view on what that looks like.

Rob Tilsley: I would imagine it's probably quite similar now to that Covid pre Covid level.

James Piper: Okay.

Rob Tilsley: the challenge we have obviously is that I guess once a cup leaves a star, it's tough then to find out what happens with it. Obviously, you know, be all a BFER rec record all, you know, the waste merchants that are, collecting, they're certainly pushing things and trying to get more and more businesses signed up. So it's certainly encouraging. So yeah, whether I would say we're very close now to that pre Covid level, but certainly seemed like Covid

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Rob Tilsley: was, you know, a momentum killer as such. And Then, like I say, consumer habits changed and things change. So.

James Piper: And do you think there's a difficulty with that, then, in BIM placement? We sort of touched on it last that, you know, they're putting bins in the coffee shops in the main, I think. And, you know, certainly when we did leads by example, we put them out on the street and we collected a lot of cups, from that. You know, just in terms of people's habits, they're buying a coffee from Starbucks or whatever. Are they likely then 5 minutes later or 10 minutes later to walk into a Costa to recycle it? I'm not sure. So. So do you see the direction of travel'kind of more on the street bins? Or do you think, actually, this is a consumer behaviour piece to go, guys, just go back into one of these participating members and drop your cup off? It can be anyone.

Rob Tilsley: Yeah, I think, to be honest, it's probably a bit of both. If the consumer knows that these cups can be recycled, then they might make a bit more of an effort to do that. but also if there were bins there that were purely for cooks, then that, that certainly makes things easier. I know they re, you know, part of the cup collective scheme. You know, for example, in Dublin, they've actually rolled out a unit where obviously cups can be stacked, liquid can be put and then lids can be put in another scheme. So there are things out there, that means that the cups can be segregated and not just mixed with, with other recycling or general waste. So I think that that would, that would. If people can see that on a high street, then that would start to drive consumers to probably look to recycle.

Jem Cropper cannot take compostable cups because the coating breaks down

M Mark ups.

Robbie Staniforth: Just talk us through with, like, what liners are you looking for? And on those cup collection bins, what, like, the best practises does the lid go separately? Like, obviously you don't want the liquid in the cup and things. Just talk us through how you think that that should best work.

Rob Tilsley: Yeah. So the cups that we take, at Jem Cropper, are the traditional PE lined cups and our process is purely designed to obviously remove the PE layer and then the fibre goes towards our paper machines. So they, the compostables, the aqueous coated of this world, we cannot take. and the reason for that is that the coating in our process actually breaks down so it doesn't separate from the fibre, it actually becomes part of the fibre and the coating then doesn't take dye. So obviously, as a colour mill, that causes us a problem. So you would have a Nice black paper being produced with lots of little fine specks with no dye on. So obviously that wouldn't be acceptable for our, end users. So that's the reason why we can't take them.

Manufacturer claims their cups are 100% paper and plastic lining free

James Piper: Okay, so we didn't really talk about aqueous coatings last week. We said we d talk about it with you here. So just to explain that to the listener. So, you know, basically, from what I understand, you're spraying on or, or you're putting. Yeah, you're coating the plastic, basically. So you're spraying it on to the paper, Is that right? Is there anything different?

Rob Tilsley: That's right. So it's, we call it dispersion coating. So instead of almost like a plastic layer'it's a coating rather than plastic. So in effect that in our process that coating just actually breaks down.

James Piper: Okay, I had a bit of an argument on Instagram with u, I won't name them, but a manufacturer of one of these cups who had put on their website 100% paper and plastic lining free. And it was like the most confusing messaging because you've basically said plastic free, but you know, it isn't. It's got a coating on, it has to have a coating on. A bit of digging shows that coating is aqueous. So of course they say aqueous coating, not plastic coating. So do you think that's. It felt to me, I mean, I can be quite honest about that. It felt to me like it was quite misleading. You know, they're saying plastic lining free to give the consumer the impression that that is plastic free. But in effect what they've actually done is sprayed it with some plastic or, bioplastic or something that is giving it that coating that now has made it unrecyclable. So, how do we deal with some of that kind of message?

Rob Tilsley: I would, what I would say is that, other mills, other facilities may still be able to take those cups.

James Piper: Okay.

Rob Tilsley: So they may be recyclable. It's just for our end users and our products, we can't take them. so I think I agree with you. In effect, it becomes very confusing for people who want to do the right thing. They don't necessari, you know, they want to do the right thing, they think they're doing the right thing, but actually are they in, in practise. So like I say, for us as a mill, we cannot take them or other mills may take them. I question where they end up. At the moment, they're probably more than likely to go for incineration something like that.

James Piper: And I mean all recycling, as our listeners will know, it comes down to economics. And my understanding is, well, again, without wishing to get into the commercial sensitivities

00:30:00

James Piper: logically, my logical leap is if you are creating a premium product, you can offer the best rates for recycled cardboard. So economically, I guess you are increasing the value of a cup compared to if it's got an aqueous coating where it can't be recycled. Is that, Could you just summarise the economics for us?

Rob Tilsley: Yes. So Bas, we recognise obviously the value of the fibre from, from this material. So we actually do pay for the material to come here and that's actually quite a shock. I speak to a lot of businesses and they're expecting to actually pay us to recycle them, whereas actually it's the other way around. You know, we pay for this material to come to James Cropper because we see the value in the fibre and.

Robbie Staniforth: That'S only if they can guarantee that it's got this polyethylene lining and you're really certain about the quality of what. And it's just unbelievably uniform. So I imagine it's only Costa Cups or only McDonald's cups kind of thing is what you're expecting, rather than these bins that say, we were talking earlier about putting around the town for any old coffee cup to be put into might be a bit more problematic for you because you can't be sure whether they're going to be a PE lined cup or an acquiesce coating. You would much rather it was like a brand specific one. And today, you were just sorting through loads of purely Starbucks cups and maybe there was the odd one that wasn't Starbucks but kind of mostly just one brand. Is that fair?

Rob Tilsley: Yeah. So that's, that's the pick. We're quite looking at the big brands that you know, Starbucks, Costa, Preatt, McDonald's, Etter. The cups that they use are the PE line ones. So obviously we know that they're fine for our process. There are a lot of other cups out there, you know, made by the big producers that are the P line cups. So your re. Smaller independents can use P line cups. You know, our, our canteen at the mill obviously uses those cups that then once they're used in on our site, they just go for recycling. So you are right, there is a risk obviously in the cook bins if you put them out there, there are cooks that we potentially would not be able to recycle. what we have always said is that if there's a very small percentage within a bale of cups, then we will always look to work with it. If it was a full bale, then the risk of contamination for our end m products is too great. So that's, that's where we are. So again you say about the Starbucks cooked, so that's, that's perfect. Obviously it's white and it's PE lined apart from at Christmas when all of a sudden it goes red and green.

Robbie Staniforth: So you don't like that then?

Rob Tilsley: So it is interesting because we don't do any bleaching or the inking in the process. So if, if we run, you know, several bales of Costa cups, for example, the fibre does have a slight pinky hue to it.

James Piper: Wow. Okay then.

Rob Tilsley: So obviously if we've got to consider that when we're selling products with cups in that if a customer wants a white paper but we only have cost of cups available, then they've got to be prepared that it may have a slight pinky hue to it.

James Piper: That's so interesting. And so, okay, so just to summarise then, the economic piece, you, it is your belief that if a bale was mostly compostable or aqueous coating, essentially the company is going to have to pay to get those recycled because the value that's coming out is going to be quite minimal. And if it's PE lined, you can pay for those cups because the value is in the cup.

Rob Tilsley: Yeah. So like I say, other, other facilities probably do take the, the compostibles and aqueous coated. We just can't take them at the mill.

James Piper: But if they're being incinerated, that's got, that's got a fee to it. So they're not paying for those cups though, they're having them take it away for a fee.

Rob Cropper: Only 3% of coffee cups are recycled

Okay, great. And I guess that leads me to a bit of a, I don't know if it's a controversial question. I'd just be interested in your view on it because we talked about it last week and we said, look, we need to make sure we asked Rob about this because I guess you've got a material here that is quite public focused. People really do care about coffee cups. So it has led to huge amount of innovation. I mean possibly the most innovation in terms of packaging, in terms of people going, I can solve this problem, IR can create a liner, that isn't plastic, is compostable, would just break down if you throw it in your garden. You know, all these messages that come out there and we're talking to you thinking, but, hang on a sec. That now affects the recycling process and means that those cups have gone from a high value to no value, you know, and so whether we think that's a good thing or not, you know, the economics of recycling are so important for us always to talk about and recognise, because what you want to do is put a product on the market that's got a value at the end of its life. but in this instance, where we've got quite a low recycling rate of, you know, 3% or something like that, I guess the question

00:35:00

is, is it better to just go, well, there's no point recycling any of this because only 3% is getting recycled, so we'll just move everything to compostable because that could, you know, because at least then something might happen to it. Or is it better for us to go, no, no, we want to standardise coffee cups because we want to turn that 3% to 50% recycling and that's what we should be doing. Do you see my question, like, I don't think I've ever come across a product where there's a big decision as to how you make that product and that decision should be linked to recycling and the recycling rate'really low.

Rob Tilsley: It is interesting because obviously, when we designed the recycling plant, the process for us to recycle these cups, you know, we're talking, when was it, ten years ago? the majority of the cups out there were PE lined cups and obviously now you've got a whole myriad of cups available. Now, obviously, like we say, the bigger brands, which is still a big share of the market, are still using the PE line cook. So therefore we, you know, we should get. Keep getting more and more cups back to us. but, yeah, the. I suppose when you look at the food packaging altogether, there's so many different grades, there's so many different products available, whereas, you know, if one product was mandated, then does it make it easier to recycle? Whichever way that may be, whether it's a PE line board or a coated compostable board, then. Then actually, does that make it simpler? But that would have to come from government legislation. So, you know, I know DEFRA had been involved in, obviously, you know, the epr and, you know, I sat on forums with them, you know, saying what our point of view was. But obviously, when it comes to products, people look to be different. And that's part of the challenge, is that if something is mandated to be, at what point does someone Then still look to be quite different. So that's part of the challenge.

James Piper: And what about like, we talked about vegware last week because obviously they have a cup that is compostable and then they say, look, we've tested it and it can be recycled. And that testing seems pretty, pretty good to me. You know what, what is that slightly different or is that within your compostable space?

Rob Tilsley: So again, like I said, because of we're quite unique as a mill. so traditional waste roots, obviously we can't use them. So your best white ones and things like that, whereas a lot of mills can. So what when we say we can't recycle them, that doesn't mean they're not recyclable, it's just we can't recycle them. At James Cropper and obviously our process is all about upcycling. So we're removing the plastic. The plastic gets recycled, the fibre gets turned into premium paper products. So that's where we're different. So we do get going back to Robbie's point before how we would want the cups coming to us. So we are seeing, for example, I get sent products regularly, you know, weird and wonderful coatings. Can we take it? Can we? But ultimately coatings all behave the same. They break down in our process.

James Piper: Yeah.

Rob Tilsley: So there are now bio based PEs out there instead of oil based ones. They actually behave like pe. So they can still go through our process. We're actually seeing a lot of testing for new fibre based lids, for example. So obviously that would then mean a consumer doesn't even have to take the lid off, they can just put the cup into a recycling bin. So. And again, a lot of these are actually okay for our process. So it just depends on, on the product. We. One of the products we recently tested was it was a purely pulp cup, no coating, no plastic. But what it did have in there was obviously a wet strength agent o to stop the cup breaking down. Now the challenge for a paper mill is once you add a wet strength agent to paper, it's then designed not to break down when it's wet. Well, what we do with these is repul them. So if they don't break down, then that causes us massive problems.

James Piper: Wow. Okay.

Robbie Staniforth: You're stuck in a loop with this bloody thing that just won't be pulpedd down.

98% of lids in 2019 will be made of polystyrene

James Piper: So it's interesting you mentioned the lids because we, I read in the, I think it was the National Rec cycling report, they were saying 98% of lids in 2019 with polystyrene. Is that, is that still the case or have people moved to other plastics now?

Rob Tilsley: I mean, just from my experience when, you know, whenever I get one of these cups, I tend to get plastic lids with, with anything but made of.

James Piper: Polystyrene though, because those are obviously not going to be recycled.

Rob Tilsley: No.

James Piper: So as opposed to,

Rob Tilsley: It's interesting, I would, I would love to see if pulp blidsds do become the norm, will that increase the rate of recycling? Because does someone having to separate the lid from a cup stop them recycling? Do they then just put it in general waste rather than recycle it? So yeah, it's, it will be interesting. But I know probably that a lot of the lids obviously don't get recycled at the moment.

James Piper: Okay,

00:40:00

James Piper: yeah, we see that, don't we, where like half a product is recyclable, half a product isn't. It can have that kind of emotive angle to it of like, oh, what's the point? You know. You know, if you take the average consumer, it's like well if this isn't getting meycled much, well not bother with the other half. And you do have that sometimes. So yeah, it's a really interesting point to pick up on and just.

Robbie Staniforth: diverging slightly from cups.

A lot of food packaging that is used in the industry actually has mechanical pulp

What's the difference between like a cup and one of those like paper or card food trays that you'd see at a food market or whatever, for example, you know, because that's got a plastic coating, hasn't it? What would that be the same in your process or is that actually something different? And why does the cup get picked on but not that sort of takeaway food trait?

Rob Tilsley: So's it's interesting because in effect. So the puls that we use at James Cropper are all chemical pulpps and they're bleached pulps. So that means they're basically white. And a lot of the food trays that you see that are the brown craft type product, they're obviously unbleached, which we don't use at James Cropper. So even if they're pe lined unbleached fibre, we couldn't take them because it's unbleached. And a lot of the food packaging that is used in the industry actually has a level of what we call mechanical pulp. So like I said, we only use chemical pulps on site. So if there's a high level of mechanical pulp in a product then we can't take it as well because that's similarly to the coatings it contaminates our process. And the mechanical fibre doesn't take dye as well. so again, that causes us problems. Now, even the cups that we take have a low level of mechanical fibre, so we obviously deal with that. So anything 5% or less we would still take as long as obviously 95% of it is the chemical pulp. So we can deal with small amounts of mechanical, but obviously if there's a high level of mechanical and then unbleached as well, then, Then we can't use that.

You are actually doing something with the plastic lr

James Piper: And, you've mentioned it a couple of times as we've been talking and I noticed an article that you. You are actually doing something with the plastic lr because one of, our frustrations with the coffee cup recycling presses that I don't think we really touched on last week, but we have talked about in other episodes, is that microplastics may then enter the waste water. Because you're removing the plastic liner, you're not recycling it, it just goes out as part of the waste of the process is going to break down into a micro plastic. you guys are unique, I think, in that you're doing something with that plastic. It'd be good just to understand what it actually becomes.

Rob Tilsley: So when we first started the process, obviously the plastic was coming out from the process and that was actually, you know, it was going for incineration. So we recognised straight away, you know, we're doing something good here in recycling the COs, but it can be better. So we worked with a waste partner, so a company that, that basically does deal with, plastic and it can be recycled. what the challenge was that when the plastic was removing from the process, obviously it had quite a lot of moisture on it and it did have some fibre on it. So we had to work to improve our process to basically remove as much moisture and as much fibre from the plastic as possible. So we did that and then that enabled us to send it to a company for recycling. So they're actually turning it into plastic pellets, which then gets used in the production of things like agricultural stretch wrap, cable ties, garden furniture, things like that.

Robbie Staniforth: That's amazing. So you're just literally squeezing out more of the moisture out of it through your process so that they can actually do something worthwhile with it. How long did it take you to get through that process? Was it like one of those things where engineers were working at a problem for years and years and years?

Rob Tilsley: It was a labour of love. we realised that we had to get to that point so it was. We kept making small improvements but not enough. So we just kept working at it and working at it and then probably, I would say two years ago we got the breakthrough and then for two years now the plastic has been going for recycling as well. So obviously we're using the fibre and now the plastic is recycled.

James Piper: Whenever we have a guest on, we like to get them to recommend a GIF for a listener. So, you got anything in mind that could, we could offer to our listeners and we'll get them to follow us on social media and then they could be in a chance of winning it.

Rob Tilsley: Well, I was just thinking, even though we can't recycle it, how about a reusable cup? Lovely.

James Piper: Think we gave away a reusable couple on the last interview, didn't we, Robie? So we're, that's ah, good though. We're doubling up here.

Robbie Staniforth: I know it's something that people like.

James Piper: Yes, that's right. We'll do a brand other than Elephant Box. So, if you didn't win the Elephant Box cup, then you've got a second opportunity to get a cool reusable cup. So I will, I think we'll give away a Yeti cup because that's the one that I've recently got've. I've got one of these, like metal yeti ones that I absolutely love. Super easy to carry around, you know, I just think they're

00:45:00

James Piper: great. So, let's give away one of those. So if you want to be in with the chance of winning that, just follow us on social media, which is rubbish. Poodcast. It will be on Instagram, like, the post with Rob's face on it. And then you'll be in with the chance of winning it. As long as you're following us and you've done that.

If you had an environmental superpower, what would you use it

Rob, I ask every guest of our the same question. So if you had an environmental superpower, what would it be and how would you use it?

Rob Tilsley: I guess for me it's something that I do see is that almost. Let's cut the crap. What is the right thing to do? And let's have consistency around that message. Let's not confuse people, let's make it easier for people to do the right thing. Because I do think 99% of people do want to do the right thing. It's just they don't know what that is.

Robbie Staniforth: It sounds like the superhero is going to be like Super Comms man or something.

James Piper: Yeah. So your superhero power is cut the crap. Which I like. By the way, what kind of messaging do you think really confuses the consumer? What, what would you actually be cutting here?

Rob Tilsley: I think there just needs to be a level of clarity, you know, for example, a compostable cup. Great, I'll put it in my compost pileot home. Well, a lot of the cups are actually only compost possible in an industrial composter. So again, is that made clear? Would that drive people to make a different decision if they knew that? So it really is about let's get facts out there and lets people allow themselves to make decisions based on facts, not mixed messaging.

James Piper: Yeah, I said to Robie, we mentioned it last week, I went to Cornwall and they had a cup that had on it. I think it said, I'm go goingna get this wrong. But it was something like recyclable, biodegradable, compostable, just bin it and you're just like, it'awful Absolutely awful.

Robbie Staniforth: So you really hate that cup, don't you?

James Piper: I hate that cup because it's been mentioned three times now. I hate that cup because it's just like, what are you trying. What? it is probably industrial compost possible, not home compost possible because they've got the just binettt message. It's definitely not going to be industrially composted by me just binning it. It's definitely not going to be recyclable by me just binning it. And it's not going to biodegrade by me just binning it because it's either getting incinerated or landfill. So the three messages, compost possible, biodegradable, recyclable, are all rendered a lie by the final message which has just been it and that is that for me.

Let's have honest, clear messaging on cup to increase recycling rates

So. So I guess what would what you're saying then, just to be clear on your superpower, Your superpower is. I don't want to put words in your mouth. So let's just check in on this. I think you're saying your superpower is every like maybe there's two or three different types of cup but on them is the message. This cup is pe lined and can be recycled and is worth x pounds a tonne. This cup is compostable and needs to go in this bin and will become this. This cup has an aqueous coating which means it has less plastic on it but is not worth as much when you recycle it. So you would say, well, legally you could only put those messages on your cup. You're one of those three things.

Rob Tilsley: Yeah.

James Piper: So that everyone understands. And you're not going around saying I'm plastic free or I'm this or I that'it's. Just clarity and the messaging that is.

Rob Tilsley: To the consumer honest and clear messaging. Yeah, I guess, I guess whatever the product is then, then let's cut the crap. Let's have honest, clear messaging so that people do actually know what they need to do with a cup. And then obviously it can extend further what they can do with other things as well. Let's have a clear message so that people know exactly what they are doing with, with a product and hopefully that will then increase recycling rates.

Robbie has helped us understand how a coffee cup rec. process works

James Piper: Well Rob, thank you so much for joining us today. It's been I'm loving as I said last time, I loved doing these little series of like we do an episode on something, then we interview an expert and then next week we're going to do an episode on the reusable cup schemes which Rob, I'm sure you've got an opinion on but we're trying to just kind of. It's a three episode coffee cup, you know, series.

Robbie Staniforth: What do we call this, a little extravaganza? Yeah. Although the one thing I will say about that, Rob, absolutely brilliant. But your rubbish process was much better than most of mine. So now I'm as ever nervous that James has found a new co host. And you've also got a similar enough name too. Robie becomes Rob.

James Piper: Would anyone notice? That's the question.

Robbie Staniforth: They'd notice because the quality would go up.

James Piper: Thank you so much Rob for joining us today and thank you for just imparting so much wisdom and really helping us understand how a coffee cup rec. Cycling process works. I've really enjoyed that Robbie. I will see you next week.

Rob Tilsley: Bye bye. Thanks.

00:50:00

Rob Tilsley: Bye.

00:50:00