News & milestones.

Recycling overflow adds new uncertainty for Victorian councils amid China import ban

Waste management in Victoria has been plunged into uncertainty, with many local councils unsure of where or how to dispose of their recyclable materials, after a major recycling company pulled back on some of its contracts.

The ABC understands the recycling company VISY told several waste-disposal companies it would cease accepting recyclable materials in early February, citing the commercial difficulties caused by China’s ban on the importation of certain types of waste.

Northern Inland Innovation Awards

Australian Recycled Plastics was named a finalist in the Manufacturing and Engineering category at the 2016 Northern Inland Innovation Awards — recognition of the innovative, first-in-Australia manufacturing process behind the plant.

Australian Recycled Plastics named Narrabri Business of the Year

Next time you put your plastic drink and milk bottles — and any other items — into your yellow recycling bins, spare a thought for the role they play in a great Narrabri success story.

Australian Recycled Plastics is its name, and the company marked a rapid rise to prominence by taking out the Business of the Year — and the Innovation in Business gong for good measure — at the 2016 Narrabri Business Awards at The Crossing Theatre on Saturday night. The company was formed by Dale and Helen Smith, spun out of the need to better utilise the trucks that their ‘other’ company, Namoi Logistics, was using.

Those trucks are the major transporter of cotton to port, but they were returning to Narrabri empty. Mr Smith said they hit upon the idea of detouring them to pick up plastic bottles from material recycling facilities all over the east coast, bringing the product back to Narrabri, and turning it into something useful for industry.

Australian Recycled Plastics: equipping a specialist facility

How Dale Smith worked with equipment specialists Telford Smith Engineering to set up Australian Recycled Plastics — a specialist recycling and washing facility producing food-grade PET.

It was a reverse-logistics conundrum and curiosity that first led the owner of a family-run Australian haulage business to investigate the potential for a plastics processing plant. In 2013, Dale Smith, founder of Australian Recycled Plastics (ARP), contacted local machinery manufacturer Telford Smith Engineering about supplying a recycling line for mixed plastic bottles for his premises in north-west New South Wales.

Dale had bought the site in Narrabri three years earlier, when he and his wife, Helen, started thinking about a recycling plant. They also own a haulage firm, which transports about 30 percent of Australia’s cotton.

New industry for Narrabri shire

Narrabri shire will soon have a major new industry — an innovative plastics recycling plant which will add a new dimension to the local and regional economy. The plastics processing facility at Narrabri West, representing a multi-million-dollar investment, will be unique in Australia.

Australian Recycled Plastics will process used plastic bottles and containers drawn from the east coast of Australia to produce clean plastic flakes ready for manufacture into new products. The sophisticated plant will sort and clean about 60 tonnes — some four million — plastic bottles and containers per day.