£41 million recycling plant opens in Northfleet

KentOnline / KMTV

The recycling plant has the capacity to process two and a half Eiffel Towers worth of copper. It's part of a bid to keep up with the demand of recycled materials.  Kristin Hawthorne reports

Transcript

00:00As global demand for recycled material grows, Britannia Refined Metals in Northfleet has

00:05unveiled its new £41 million investment into the UK's circular economy.

00:11This is the system that prioritises the reuse of materials and elimination of waste.

00:17The site aims to recover copper and other important materials from everyday items like

00:21fridges, microwaves and mobile phones.

00:24There's a lot of value in the urban waste and the urban waste is very crucial for us

00:29to be able to recycle materials and to feed it into the metals stream. By doing this and

00:35being able to value the metals, we can create a closed economy.

00:41The plant was officially opened by the Mayor of Gravesham, Councillor Jenny Wallace, before

00:45tours of the facility began. She says that the benefits of the site is more than just its

00:51recycling capabilities.

00:52I mean, already it's brought local employment, but there's going to be more local employment,

00:57which is so important. And it's putting Gravesham, Northfleet is part of Gravesham, the borough

01:03of Gravesham, it's putting them on the map yet again. And it's very important because we've

01:09got so much heritage and we've got so much in the way of industry and so much to offer.

01:14And we want more people, more growth, because that's the other thing, growth, it's bringing

01:18growth to us.

01:19But how does it all work?

01:21So what happens here at this facility is we take in copper-bearing waste. It then passes

01:27through a series of samplers and shredders. The shredders make the material into a uniform

01:34size and the samples take calculated cuts for us to be able to create a representative

01:40sample of the material. That sample from here goes down to a second facility, which is on

01:47our BRM site where the material is passed through various furnaces to create another sample, a

01:54smaller sample of the original. That we use to value the material, the waste.

02:00With capacity to handle around 25,000 tonnes of metal a year, this new plant puts Kent at the

02:06heart of the UK's push towards a more sustainable metal industry.

02:09Kirsten Hawthorne for KMTV in Northfleet.

02:12Kirsten Hawthorne for KMTV in Northfleet.

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