Our Heritage
Our CEO and Founder, Joseph Eccleston was born into the carpet industry – literally! From a very early age he was involved in the family business; – selling, fitting and removing carpets. It was this experience that showed him how wasteful of valuable resource the discarding of end-of-life carpet to landfill and incineration really is, and he became determined to find a different solution…
The History
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The Board and Senior Management Team of Innovate Recycle are determined to change the way in which we handle waste carpet in the UK, ensuring that increasing amounts are not sent to landfill or incineration. Together, they have worked to make the case for a circular economy approach to carpet manufacturing and to ensure that we retrieve and reuse the valuable resources available within waste carpet. Now, with the backing of a committed group of private sector investors, the UK government, the South-East Midlands LEP and the Getting Building Fund, the dream of being able to provide a true UK recycling solution for carpet – by recapturing polypropylene and calcium carbonate for reuse in industry will be a reality from Autumn 2022.
The Future
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Forward-thinking companies, from global brands and manufacturers down to innovative new SMEs are realising and acting upon both the responsibility of enabling the re-use and recycling of their products, but also the market opportunity that embracing the circular economy offers.
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Plastic is everywhere. It is not going to go away and has of course enabled an almost infinite range of products over the last century that have enhanced our lives. What is wrong, as we all increasingly realise, is the prevalence of single use plastics, microbeads and our still relatively poor performance on the reuse and recycling of plastic.
Polypropylene based carpet has been a particularly bad performer, going to landfill, being burnt for energy or, still, shredded for use in equine arenas.
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At Innovate Recycle, we will begin to recapture polypropylene from end-of-life carpet for reuse from Autumn 2022. We will work with customer aware carpet manufacturers and retailers, with environmentally focused local authorities and with the UK government to ensure that this part of the emerging circular economy is fully realised.
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We will also continually work with industry partners to find new ways to reutilise our reclaimed polypropylene and to return the recaptured material to a virgin-like state.
Our CEO Joseph Eccleston says:
“Innovate Recycle are leading the way on first steps to building a circular economy approach to carpet waste, capturing resource and reusing that, in the carpet industry or for use in other applications. We are talking to industry of recycled polymer and finalising agreements with local authorities to take carpet waste previously destined for shredding, burning and landfill. So, if you think you can use our recycled polypropylene, or if you’re local authority is looking for a new solution, we’d be delighted to talk to you.”
