flooring resource efficiency plan stuart blofeld bre 3 rd march 2010
TRANSCRIPT
Flooring Resource Efficiency Plan
Stuart BlofeldBRE
3rd March 2010
Contents
• Background to project• Flooring Scoping study• Flooring Resource Efficiency Plan • Who’s involved• Material Action Plans for Carpet and Carpet Tiles
Strategy for Sustainable Construction
• Joint industry/Government
• Help to deliver UK’s Sustainable Development Framework
• Aims – Providing clarity to business on the
Government's position – Setting and committing to higher standards– Making specific commitments by industry and
Government– Specific targets set by Government and
industry to achieve
Waste targets
Scoping Study
• Scoping Study January - March 2009• Looked at where waste was generated
throughout supply chain• Initial survey of what recycling was
happening• Available on CPA Website
http://www.constructionproducts.org.uk/publications/dbfiles/Flooring final 11-9-09.pdf
• Series of recommendations
Products Considered
• Carpets• Vinyl• Linoleum• Ceramics • Wood• Laminate• Rubber• Resin
Scoping Study
• Spoke with stakeholders– Raw material suppliers
– Manufacturers
– Installers
– Waste handlers
– Trade Associations
Summary of Study (all flooring types)
• Covered majority of interior flooring surfaces• Total estimated wastage 580,000 tonnes
– 414,000 tonnes (71%) of which is carpet waste
• <1% recycled• Majority goes to landfill, some is incinerated• Lots of small, often successful recycling schemes which
are often supplier or material specific
Market Size of UK Flooring Sector per (million m²)
Total Flooring Waste Generated ‘000 tonnes/year
% of flooring waste to landfill
Carpet sector
• Most common floorcovering in the UK• Domestic carpet sector – 120-170 million m² per
annum• Contract market – 40 million m²• 60-70% of carpets sold in the UK are imported• Carpet makes up nearly 8% of fly tipped material• Collected and shredded for use in equestrian surfaces and
small scale felting operations• Several suppliers of carpet tiles will take back tiles for
resale (1000 tonnes per annum)• Vast majority of carpet is still disposed to landfill
Future actions required
• Information is needed on quantity and type of carpet that goes through the various disposal routes
• Specifications needed for individual carpet waste streams that could be recyclable
• Collection system is needed that can cope with various disposal routes (municipal, household waste recycling sites and trade waste sites)
• System required for easily identifying the composition of carpet waste
• Route required for disposing of a large volume of mixed fibre waste
Key issues identified in scoping study
• There is no major cost driver to encourage anyone in the supply chain to set up a profitable recycling operation. The main obstacles are:
– Flooring materials after they have been used may have limited value due to contamination
– Flooring materials are frequently of complex composition
– The cost of processing the flooring waste is high in relation to its value
– The quantity of flooring material is low in comparison to other major waste streams
– Flooring waste that is generated is widely dispersed across the country
• The cost of transporting small quantities of waste flooring around the country soon exceeds the value of the material
• Potential central collection points are at locations which are not licensed to receive waste
• The individual waste streams are contaminants for each other so require segregation for most applications
• Flooring which has been mixed with general waste is difficult to get clean enough to reprocess
Recommendations from scoping study
• Develop a resource efficiency action plan
• One Stop Shop for Flooring Waste
• Discuss potential end uses for materials
• Survey on waste flooring
• Analysis flooring distribution
• Develop a clean handling system
• Quality protocols
• Resource Efficiency Programme with the UK carpet manufacturers
• A pilot mixed flooring collection and segregation scheme
Flooring Resource Efficiency Plan
Project scope
• Project to be completed by 31st March 2010• Established a flooring industry working group including 5
MAP sub-groups currently formulating Material Action Plans (see below)
• Undertake flooring waste survey• Development of Flooring waste website• Formation of a Flooring Resource Efficiency Plan which
includes five flooring Material Action Plans (MAPs):– Carpet & underlay– Carpet tiles– Resin– Resilient (inc Vinyl/Rubber/Linoleum) – Hard (inc Ceramic/Natural stone/Terrazzo)
Who’s involved in Flooring Resource Efficiency Plan project?
• Joint funding providers: WRAP and BRE Trust (total £64k)• Management & Technical consultant: Pete Thomas Environmental and
BRE• Publisher of Flooring Resource Efficiency Plan and flooring Industry
Lead: Contract Flooring Association (CFA) • Facilitator: Construction Products Association• Carpet MAP leads: CRUK and Carpet Foundation• Carpet Tile MAP leads: CRUK and CFA• Hard flooring MAP lead: The Tile Association • Resilient flooring MAP lead: UKRFA (UK Resilient Flooring Association)• Resin flooring MAP lead: Ferfa (Resin Flooring Association)
Other project stakeholders
• BERR • 4Recycling Ltd• Altro • Amtico • Axion • Beyond Waste • British Institute of Facilities Management • British Plastics Federation • Burmatex • Carillion • Carpetright Plc• Chartered Institute of Waste
Management • Costdown • Defra • Department for Business • Desso • EC Modular • Environment Agency
• Forbo • Gradus • Headlam Group• Interface • Interfloor • John Lewis Partnership• Karndean • Landsdon (Carpet & Flooring) • LARAC• Loughton • Milliken • National Federation of Terrazzo, Marble
and Mosaic Specialists • Paragone • Pilkingtons Tiles • Polyflor • Shaw • Stone Federation • Tarkett
Waste Survey
• Purpose of survey to follow on from the scoping study and identify current waste management practices in the flooring sector
• Targeted:– Designers– Manufacturers– Distributors– Installers– Waste Contractors– Local Authorities
• Online survey conducted from Nov – Jan 10• 77 responses
Turnover
02040
<£5...
£50...
£10...
£25...
£50...
£1m ...
£3m ...
£5m ...
More...
Turnover
% o
f Res
pond
ees
Employees
05
1015202530
<4 4-9 10-19 20-49 50-99 100-249 250-499 500+
Employees
% o
f Res
pond
ees
Materials Handled
0%10%20%30%40%50%60%
Carpet
tiles
Carpet
broad
loom
Laminate
Ceramic ti
les
Porcelai
n tiles
Natural stone
Terra
zzo Vinyl
Rubber
Linoleum
ResinW
ood
Wastes Segregated
0%
20%
40%
60%
80%
100%
Cardboard Paper Metal Wood Plastic Flooringwaste
Surplus Flooring
0.00%10.00%20.00%30.00%40.00%50.00%60.00%70.00%
Leave withclient fordisposal
Chargeclient forremoving
Take togeneralwaste
collectionfacility e.g.
waste
Take tospecialist
flooringwaste
collectionfacility
Return tobase foruse on
other jobs
Return tosupplier
Other
Uplifted Flooring
0%10%20%30%40%50%60%70%80%90%
100%
Leave withclient fordisposal
Charge clientfor removing
Take togeneralwaste
collectionfacility
Take tospecialist
flooringwaste
collectionfacility
Take back tobase
Other
Installers Constraints on Recycling
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
None Extra Cost Lack ofspace
Noavai lable
outlets formateria ls
Legalconstra ints
Logistics Other
Distributors constraints
0%10%20%30%40%50%60%70%80%
None Cost Time Noavailableresource
Spaceconstraints
Noavailable
outlets formaterials
Logistics
www.flooringwaste.co.uk
Carpet and Carpet Tile Material Action Plans
• Each MAP will cover:– Key Challenges for the flooring sub-sector
– Key Recommendations
– MAP Targets
– Material Action Plan
– Case Studies
• MAP’s are being developed through a series of stakeholder workshops
• MAP groups have met 2 or 3 times since November 2009
Carpet/Underlay and Carpet Tiles Material Action Plan
• Carpet/Underlay MAP group:– 4Recycling – BRE – Carpet Foundation– Carpet Recycling UK– Carpetwright – CFA – DEFRA – Headlam Group – Interfloor – John Lewis Partnership– LARAC– Remade Southeast – Tyndale– WRAP
• Carpet Tiles MAP group:– Axiom– BRE– Burmatex– Carillion
– Carpet Recycling UK– Desso– EC Modular– Econpro– Forbo– Gradus– Interface– Loughton– PFT Environmental – Shaw– Shell– Total– Tyndale Flooring– WRAP
Carpet/Underlay MAP [DRAFT]Key Challenge Action(s)
Lack of end markets •Market Feasibility study into to identify barriers to each end market. Especially non woven, insulation and waste to energy?•Document existing flooring waste trials that have gone well and can go into the public domain•Carry out more publicly funded trials where results can be disseminated•Each potential end use should have Carbon Balance / LCA carried out
Lack of data on flooring recovery •Establish independent auditable source of data on the amount of flooring being recycled•Determine the data required to provide the baselines for setting targets and the frequency of data collected to show progress
Collection of waste materials (logistics) •Set up a take back scheme(s) for collection of waste carpet from retailers to recyclers•Carry out a short survey with potential customers and installers who are already charging to understand how much customers would pay for the carpet to be uplifted and recycled•Household waste centre segregation trials around the country•Trial funding of a collection for recovery by 3rd party working in conjunction with a large retailer (Upgraded Spruce)
Identify and segregate flooring waste •Develop cheap cost effective method for identifying materials (cf slip testing/surface roughness)•Cheap leasing for current technology (Phaser)•Identify sites that are employing best practice and set up as demonstration sites to provide informative case studies, demonstrate what can be done now and educate the supply chain
Roles and responsibilities within the flooring chain
•Series of workshops with manufacturers to address what they can do to increase recycled content and ease of recycling: Avoiding fibre blends; Back Marking; Looking at using recycled filler content; Lower impact feedstocks•Retailers to better educate their consumers to address segregation•Discuss with local Government their responsibility to address the issue of large amount of carpet is going to landfill via the local authority
Education of whole supply chain inc consumers to promote best practice / recycling / segregation
•Produce a Voluntary Agreement based around the Construction Industry’s Commitment to meet the proposed targets. This to be signed by companies and trade associations across all sectors
Carpet Tile MAP [DRAFT]
Key Challenge Action(s)
Logistics of recovery and collection • Proposed two demonstrator projects for collection and recovery of carpet tile waste: One focusing on Large contractor and the other for Small contractors
Majority of waste from refurbishment goes direct to general skip and hence to Material Recovery Facilities
• Proposed to undertake study into processes at waste management contractor MRFs to understand if and how carpet tiles can be recovered from these types of facilities
Difficulty of separation of component parts
• Develop disposal routes that do not require the segregation of the individual layers prior to use
Identification of material types • Look to develop low cost fibre identification system or arrange low cost leasing for existing Phaser™ equipment
Lack of fibre reprocessing capacity in the UK
• Produce a cost benefit analysis and a carbon balance/LCA on recovering the fibre prior to using the base layer in roadstone compared with using the entire tile for roadstone without segregation.• The same should be done for disposing via an energy from waste plant
Lack of Reuse market • Approach refurbishers to get a better estimate of the market size. • Proposal required to develop a 2 specifications:
• Uplifted tiles to be acceptable to a refurbisher. Would cover state of the tiles, the way they must be packed and storage prior to delivery• Refurbished tiles to assist the growth of the market
Legal Implications • Open discussions with Defra to understand the potential drivers for such a ban, and what material/product types are most likely to be included in any future legislation that bans waste to landfill (DEFRA consultation paper due at end of month)
