Finland’s intention is to be one of the leading countries in circular economy and this is more and more visible through practical acts in different levels of the community. One requirement for the circular economy is the separate collection of the materials which enables their efficient processing into raw material for new products. This year plastic packages are separately collected also at the Finland’s biggest rock festival Ruisrock. The Finnish Plastics Recycling, Fortum and Amerplast are cooperating to recycle the festival’s plastic packaging.
Ruisrock is held in Turku, Finland for the 48th time this year. In the summer of 2016 Ruisrock attracted a record audience of 100 000 festival visitors. This equals also a great amount of plastic packaging waste which this year will be separately collected for the first time in the event area. Finnish Plastics Recycling Ltd, the official extended producer organization for more than 2300 companies in Finland, is supporting the separate collection of both consumer and business packaging in this year’s Ruisrock.
”It is important to circulate valuable plastic material as raw material for new plastic products through separate collection. We want to raise the awareness of people and companies to sort plastic packaging in a way that makes recycling possible. This is really crucial for the downstream operation and utilizing of the materials. Now we want to pass this information forward also in Ruisrock”, says Peter Rasmussen, Director The Finnish Plastics Recycling Ltd.
The separately collected plastic packaging waste will be processed in Fortum’s Circular Economy Village’s Plastic Refinery. The Plastic Refinery is one of Fortum’s concrete steps towards circular economy; a society where materials circulate as long as they hold value. In the process plastic packaging waste will become CIRCO®-recycled plastic raw material for the plastics industry to produce new plastic products.
”Consumers have an important role in the Finnish circular economy. Sorting at home and recycling the plastic packaging through collection points is very important in order to get good quality material collected for downstream operation. The use of recycled materials reduces the need for virgin raw materials and thereby saves natural resources. In addition Finnish recycling and circular economy creates business and employment in Finland”, says Kalle Saarimaa, VP Fortum Recycling and Waste Solutions.
Amerplast produces ESSI Circular Bags from the recycled raw material processed by Fortum. ESSI is the first Finnish retail bag which is produced by using plastic packaging waste which is separately collected from the consumers. The whole Finnish society from consumers to retailers, industrial activators and governmental decision makers can all take part in the creation of ESSI.
”ESSI Circular Bag is a responsible choice and a concrete circular economy product. ESSI has been received very positively in the market and the awareness as well as ESSI’s popularity have continuously grown after the launch in January. Conscious retailers as well as consumers want to make sustainable choices for Finland and for the environment and it is truly exciting to be a part of making it a reality”, states Ari-Pekka Pietilä, Group Sales and R&D Manager, Amerplast. Today we have in place the necessary infrastructure for the recycling and the manufacture of circular bags from consumer waste, so we can leave other plastic carrier bags behind us tomorrow, if we so choose.
For additional information, please contact:
Amerplast
Ari-Pekka Pietilä
Group Sales and R&D Director
ari-pekka [dot] pietila [at] amerplast [dot] com (ari-pekka[dot]pietila[at]amerplast[dot]com)
Tel. +358 (0)50 385 6587
Fortum
Kalle Saarimaa
VP Fortum Recycling and Waste Solutions
kalle [dot] saarimaa [at] fortum [dot] com (kalle[dot]saarimaa[at]fortum[dot]com)
Tel. +358 (0)10 755 1585
The Finnish Plastics Recycling Ltd.
Peter Rasmussen
Director
peter [dot] rasmussen [at] uusiomuovi [dot] fi (peter[dot]rasmussen[at]uusiomuovi[dot]fi)
Tel. +358 (0)50 434 5827