TerraCycle’s Zero Waste Boxes are designed to offer a safe recycling solution for PPE waste.
With millions of gloves and masks being thrown away every day, it’s not hard to see why conservationists around the world are sounding the alarm over where all these single-use products are ending up. Single-use PPE masks and gloves are considered non-recyclable types of waste in traditional recycling systems. TerraCycle, however, offers a solution to collect and recycle PPE via its Zero Waste Box system – a turnkey solution to recycle hard-to-recycle waste for individuals, households, schools, businesses, manufacturing facilities, and events looking to offset their impacts and lighten their environmental footprint.
When placed in public spaces such as within businesses, TerraCycle’s Zero Waste Boxes for PPE encourage people to responsibly dispose of their PPE for recycling instead of throwing these items into landfill bins or often simply throwing them on the ground after use.
To recycle PPE waste in the UK, TerraCycle offers a variety of different Zero Waste Boxes, including its latest box dedicated specifically to the recycling of disposable face masks:
Disposable Gloves and Face Masks Zero Waste Box – to recycle both surgical, industrial face masks and to recycle vinyl, nitrile, and latex glove
Disposable Face Masks Zero Waste Box – to recycle surgical and industrial face masks
Disposable Gloves Zero Waste Box – to recycle vinyl, nitrile, and latex gloves
Safety Equipment & Protective Gear Zero Waste Box – to recycle disposable safety gear including garments, gloves, masks and safety glasses
When full, the boxes are returned to TerraCycle for processing and the collected PPE waste is first aggregated before being cleaned and melted into pellets. The resulting recycled pellet material can then be used by third parties to manufacture a variety of new products including outdoor furniture, plastic shipping pallets, outdoor decking, watering cans, storage containers, bins, tubes for construction applications, and more.
Due to the Coronavirus outbreak, TerraCycle is taking extra measures to ensure the safety of its operators. Anyone self-isolating, quarantined or suspected of being infected with Covid-19, should not use the Zero Waste Box solution to recycle their PPE material.
TerraCycle’s PPE Zero Waste Box solutions do not accept fabric, homemade or paper face masks but can collect surgical-type masks as long as they don’t come from a medical environment. As per legal guidelines, it’s not possible to accept any medical waste, such as material contaminated with blood or bodily fluids and waste originating from health care facilities, hospitals, home care services, physicians’ offices, dental offices, blood banks, veterinary clinics, research laboratories, etc.
“Considering these uncertain COVID-19 times, we have increased our PPE Zero Waste Box offering, to provide more specific solutions for these objects which are now increasingly part of daily life,” says Laure Cucuron, General Manager of TerraCycle Europe. “We are proud to be able to offer all consumers a unique, easy and safe solution for keeping PPE waste out of landfills and from being littered, paving the way for a greener future.”
