COVER STORY
CIRCULAR APPROACH
The COP26 climate change conference has helped to focus everyone’s attention on sustainability. Tork manufacturer Essity is now demonstrating its own sustainability credentials by introducing the world’s first recycling service for paper hand towels - and appealing to prestigious new customers.
Disposable hand towels are hygienic and convenient. They dramatically speed up the hand-drying process compared with air dryers of any kind and they have become increasingly popular since the start of the global pandemic.
According to a 2020 United Minds/Essity survey more than 60% of people now routinely use paper towels as a barrier to prevent them from having to touch washroom surfaces such as door handles and light switches.
Around 29% admit to an increased preference for paper hand towels as a result of Covid-19, while nearly 40% say they are less likely to visit a washroom where paper towels are not offered as a hand drying alternative.
But it is an inescapable fact that hand towels need to be disposed of after use and they are usually treated as household waste on account of being difficult and costly to recycle.
These recycling issues stem from the fact that wet- strength agents are added to paper towels during the manufacturing process. The aim is to increase the absorbency of the towels and prevent them from breaking up during use. The presence of these wet strength agents means that paper hand towels need to be handled separately and cannot be recycled alongside other paper- based materials.
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Following years of research, Tork manufacturer Essity has overcome these obstacles and has now launched the world’s first recycling service for hand towels. Tork PaperCircle enables businesses to meet their sustainability targets by reducing waste by up to 20% and cutting carbon emissions by up to 40% compared with other waste management systems.
This is how it works. Customer washrooms are supplied with bespoke washroom bins for hand towels and these are marked with clear signs and stickers to prompt visitors to use them. The cleaners then empty the hand towel bins at the same time as all the other waste receptacles, taking care to keep the hand towels separate on the trolley.
The towels are then collected from the customer site by an environmental partner before being processed and sent to a mill for recycling into other tissue products.
Tork PaperCircle has been in operation in continental Europe since 2016 and more than 600 tonnes of paper hand towels have been turned into new tissue so far. The service has recently been expanded to cover the UK and France – and world-renowned pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca is among the first UK customers.
The multinational behind one of the world’s most widely- administered Covid-19 vaccines has been trialling Tork
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