Changing way we shop can help solve plastic waste crisis

YESTERDAY I had the pleasure of visiting Lamby Way’s recycling plant, all in the name of curiosity and research for this here column.

My interest in rubbish all started last week when I had the pleasure of meeting Sophie Rae who is planning to open Ripple, a zero-waste shop in Cardiff.

You only have to open a newspaper or social media to see something about the evils of plastic waste, in particular single-use plastic.

Sophie gave me some depressing facts and stats.

Ninety-one per cent of plastic waste isn’t recycled. There are a trillion plastic bags, 480 billion plastic bottles, and 8.5 billion plastic straws used worldwide every year. In the UK, we throw away 2.5 billion disposable coffee cups each year. Only one in 400 is recycled.

Globally just 14% of plastic packaging is recycled, and a third ends up in the environment, much of it in vast stretches of “plastic soup” in our oceans.

What, I wondered, have I done to create the problem? I mean, I don’t litter – like many of you, I even pick up other people’s litter on occasion – and I recycle as much as possible. I even own a reusable coffee cup.

I assumed I was part of the solution rather than the problem. But it’s not the case. It’s not enough. We all have a collective responsibility to help limit our usage of single-use plastics.

“Single-use plastics in terms of volume is probably the biggest type of litter we encounter,” Dave King, a founder of Cardiff Rivers Group, tells me. “By buying single-use products you are helping create the demand for this type of packaging. By switching to non-plastic or recycled packaging that can either be reused, recycled or composted you are switching that demand and helping create a market for much more sustainable products.”

The Cardiff Rivers Group know all about the scourge of plastic detritus, which is having a negative impact right here in Cardiff. Over their 14 clean-up events so far this year at riverbanks as well as other natural areas like Splott “beach” and parts of Cardiff Bay, they have produced 299 sacks of plastic alone.

It was of course my privilege to visit the Materials Recycling Facility (MRF), to use its official title. After all, the council-owned site, which opened last summer, is “one of the best in Europe”, according to Councillor Michael Michael, cabinet member for clean streets, recycling and environment.

In part due to the high tax applied to it, Cardiff now has a zero landfill policy. So nothing you throw away in Cardiff now ends up in landfill.

Cardiff currently processes 42,000 tonnes of green-bagged recycling waste every year.

What can’t be recycled goes to the Viridor plant (the big ski slope-like building in the Bay) which burns it to create electricity (enough to power 50,000 homes) and returns 22% of the waste in the form of ash which can be used in construction.

Inside the huge sorting plant, it’s an eye-opening (and nose-closing) experience standing next to such a mountain of green bag waste. But up to 40% of bags can contain incorrect items.

“It’s part of changing people’s mind set about looking after their city,” says Matt Wakelam, the council’s head of infrastructure and operations. “Just 150 staff in Lamby Way can’t solve the city’s waste problems. We need to work with people to ensure we can use our rubbish to make money because these items do have value.”

In some good news, last year Wales hit Welsh Government’s 2020 recycling target of 64%.

Here in Cardiff, though, we recycle and compost 58% of waste, and the council faces huge fines of up to £21m if it fails to meet the 2020 target.

“Cardiff is the number one recycler of all UK core cities, so in context, compared to other big urban areas, we’re good,” says Councillor Michael.

It’s only by comparison to other parts of Wales that he acknowledges “we’re not doing so well”.

“As a city we do very well but we need our citizens to take things to the next level,” he says.

Out to take things to the next level and offer her fellow Cardiffians a solution to help reduce their packaging consumption is Sophie Rae. She aims to open a not-for-profit zero-waste shop as early as September in a noncity centre location yet to be finalised.

It won’t be Wales’ first zero-waste shop – Crickhowell’s Natural Weigh has that claim to fame.

“I’m not anti-plastic. It’s a miraculous material, it’s just single-use plastic that’s the problem,” Sophie tells me. “For us the Ripple message is reduce, reuse, recycle, but in the first instance it’s refuse – recycling has to be option B.”

There’ll be between 120 to 160 dry bulk wholefoods – pulses, grains, nuts, seeds, dried fruits, cereals – “everything you can’t find not in plastic in a supermarket” – which are supplied by Bristol ethical cooperative Essential in 20kg paper sacks.

“Packaging accounts for a fifth of a typical weekly supermarket spend. So this is a very cost effective way to shop for that reason and because it’s tackling food waste,” she says.

Folks will bring their reusable jars, bottles and ice cream tubs which they weigh before shopping and then again once they’ve filled them, and a bar code label will be produced for scanning at the till.

The shop will also sell natural beauty products, many of which happen to be made in Wales, such as lip balm from Bridgend, as well as sustainable home ware, cleaning and laundry products, and honey.

“It’s about making small changes, and slowly, just as plastics eased their way into our homes, so the alternatives can too.”

While Sophie plans to do a scaled back pop-up if her Kickstarter doesn’t succeed in raising £30,000 by the time the campaign ends on Sunday (which will mean she receives no funding), I really hope she smashes it. To help her make it happen, please visit: http:// bit.ly/rippleliving

Meanwhile, lots of folks across Cardiff are doing their bit. Take Phill Lewis of Dusty Knuckle pizza fame who has introduced Italian reusable pizza boxes that have proved (no dough pun intended) so popular that he’s become the UK distributor to other restaurants.

“We never liked giving out singleuse, cardboard boxes for takeaways. It felt wasteful. So far, the feedback on the reusable ones has been really good. Lots of our takeaway regulars have switched over because they get 50p off their order every time they use them.”

Two more locals making a difference are Nia Jones and Douglas Lewns who set up The No Straw Stand this time last year to encourage Cardiff businesses to take “the stand” against single-use plastic straws. They now have around 50 on board.

They suggested to the council that it try to educate young kids about the need to protect the oceans with the help of two books by author Ellie Jackson. The books about Duffy the sea turtle and Marli the puffin are going to 113 schools, and will be read by 27,000 kids.

“The response so far is fantastic,” says Councillor Michael. “These kids care. It’s their world, their future.”