How to start your recycling sorting center
Our goal with our work at mondo4africa is to cause the greatest possible impact on the continent and on the rest of the world to what concerns climate change and plastic crisis. For this reason, on this page we want to focus on helping all those who, like us, seek to create an impact in their community and manage to replicate what we are achieving in the coast of Africa.
Here we present you this small guide where we explain the steps to follow so that you can build your own recycling center in your city. Of course, from an ecological and economically sustainable perspective, thus you become the fight against plastic as your way of life.
Here are the plastic recycling business steps to fully setting up a sustainable plastic recycling Sorting Center:
While a lot of people are actively involved in plastic recycling, they face a major challenge; an adequate startup capital. The startup capital for running a plastic recycling factory is on a high end. It’s estimated to cost about $84,000 to set up a plastic recycling factory. This cost is extremely high for the common man because of the cost of building the factory, purchasing the recycling machines, and many other factors. But around every problem, there’s a solution or two lurking around the corner. Rather than setting up a plastic recycling factory, recycling businesses are springing up that focus majorly on the collection and distribution of plastic bottle wastes to plastic recyclers. This opportunity pays off greatly for many businesses that want to venture into full time plastic recycling on the long run. If your business starts with collecting plastic bottles, you could be on your way to owning your own recycling factory with dedicated hard and smart work.
Before you start your collection of plastic bottle recyclables, you need to know what type of plastic bottles are majorly used, what processes the plastic bottles go through before the final sale, the recycling machines that are used, and a lot more important facts. You could even buy some Waste Balers to help with your recycling!
This plastic recycling business plan for the collection and supply of plastic bottle recyclables, would give you a broad insight on what it takes to start collecting plastic bottles for recycling.
Our goal with our work at mondo4africa is to cause the greatest possible impact on the continent and on the rest of the world to what concerns climate change and plastic crisis.
For this reason, on this page we want to focus on helping all those who, like us, seek to create an impact in their community and manage to replicate what we are achieving in the coast of Africa.
Here we present you this small guide where we explain the steps to follow so that you can build your own recycling center in your city. Of course, from an ecological and economically sustainable perspective, thus you become the fight against plastic as your way of life.
Here are the plastic recycling business steps to fully setting up a sustainable plastic recycling Sorting Center:
While a lot of people are actively involved in plastic recycling, they face a major challenge; an adequate startup capital. The startup capital for running a plastic recycling factory is on a high end. It’s estimated to cost about $84,000 to set up a plastic recycling factory. This cost is extremely high for the common man because of the cost of building the factory, purchasing the recycling machines, and many other factors. But around every problem, there’s a solution or two lurking around the corner. Rather than setting up a plastic recycling factory, recycling businesses are springing up that focus majorly on the collection and distribution of plastic bottle wastes to plastic recyclers. This opportunity pays off greatly for many businesses that want to venture into full time plastic recycling on the long run. If your business starts with collecting plastic bottles, you could be on your way to owning your own recycling factory with dedicated hard and smart work.
Before you start your collection of plastic bottle recyclables, you need to know what type of plastic bottles are majorly used, what processes the plastic bottles go through before the final sale, the recycling machines that are used, and a lot more important facts. You could even buy some Waste Balers to help with your recycling!
This plastic recycling business plan for the collection and supply of plastic bottle recyclables, would give you a broad insight on what it takes to start collecting plastic bottles for recycling.
STEP 1: WHAT TYPE OF PLASTIC BOTTLES DO RECYCLING FACTORIES REQUIRE?
Polyethylene Terephthalate (PET) is the answer. These are the common plastic bottles that you see on a daily basis. Examples of these are soda and water bottles like the coca-cola plastic bottles, pepsi plastic bottles, most bottled waters, and many more. PET bottles are majorly used because, they are the easiest to recycle. Their recycled by-products can be used to make life jackets, bags, ropes, furniture, combs, car bumpers, and of course, plastic bottles. There are also other types of plastic bottles that can be recycled, but PET bottles are the most popular plastic bottles that are recycled in the world.
Step 2: How can I find plastic bottles for recycling?
There are various channels to acquire plastic bottles:
1). You can get plastic bottles by building small metal trucks and leasing it out to individuals that’d push the trucks on a daily basis:
These individuals would move from place to place to pick up plastic bottles on the streets, then drop them in their trucks. When they’ve picked up so much for the day, they would reconvene at your recycling dump site to weigh what they’ve collected and get paid for it. This means if they can turn in 1000kg (one ton) a day, they’d get paid subsequently with the right adjusted calculation. This fee is a standard in the plastic recycling industry per country. A perfect example of a recycling company that uses a similar method is Wecyclers (who help us in our first event! check more on Makoko Clean Up!). They use something they call Wecycles to pick up plastic bottles from households and the likes.
2). You can get plastic bottles from event centers:
After every occasion and event, lots of plastic bottles are always littered around. You could make a good deal by talking with the cleaners, security staff, or the event organisers themselves to either give you their plastic waste for free, or sell them to you for a small fee.
3). You can get plastic waste from restaurants and fast-foods:
With thousands of restaurants and fast-foods scattered all across the country, there’s an abundance of plastic bottle wastes to be collected daily. Strike deals with the cleaners, and they would store and sell the plastic bottle wastes to you for a little personal extra cash at the end of each day.
4). You could pick from public dump sites:
Dump sites by far have the largest collection of plastic wastes. But beware of the cabals at the dump sites. They control everything from the pickup to the payments. This collection method was saved for last because, although it has huge potentials, the politicking behind getting the plastic wastes from any dump site might not be worth your time.
There are many other intelligent means to get plastic wastes like offering households incentives to store their plastic wastes for your collection business, and many more. Get creative and explore several other channels for collecting plastic wastes no one else has explored.
2). You can get plastic bottles from event centres:
After every occasion and event, lots of plastic bottles are always littered around. You could make a good deal by talking with the cleaners, security staff, or the event organizers themselves to either give you their plastic waste for free, or sell them to you for a small fee.
3). You can get plastic waste from restaurants and fast-foods:
With thousands of restaurants and fast-foods scattered all across the country, there’s an abundance of plastic bottle wastes to be collected daily. Strike deals with the cleaners, and they would store and sell the plastic bottle wastes to you for a little personal extra cash at the end of each day.
4). You could pick from public dump sites:
Dump sites by far have the largest collection of plastic wastes. But beware of the cabals at the dump sites. They control everything from the pickup to the payments. This collection method was saved for last because, although it has huge potentials, the politicking behind getting the plastic wastes from any dump site might not be worth your time.
There are many other intelligent means to get plastic wastes like offering households incentives to store their plastic wastes for your collection business, and many more. Get creative and explore several other channels for collecting plastic wastes no one else has explored.
5). You can organized Clean Up Events:
5). You could organized Clean Up Events
Step 3: now i know how to get plastic bottle wastes. what next?
Next you need to consider transportation and many other factors. Transporting the plastic bottle wastes from various pick up sites to your personal dump site, and finally the recycling company’s factory, also carries its own cost. Transportation could reduce or completely eliminate your potential profit if not handled well. But hey, there’re ways to still transport and still make it sustainable. These methods have to do with what happens to the plastics when they get to your dump site before transportation to the recycling factory for sale:
1). If you sort and clean the plastic bottles before you deliver it, the amount you’d be paid goes a little higher.
2). If after sorting, you use a baling and cutting machine to compress the plastic bottle wastes to smaller sizes, you’d be paid even more for the recyclable delivered to the recycler for sale.
3). If after baling, you use a grinding machine to grind the baled plastics, your selling price goes even higher.
With this plastic bottle recycling business plan for a collection & distribution business, you can better easily get started. Visit local plastic bottle dumpsites in your city to see how it all works. This would fully prepare your mind for the task ahead. With the right tools, hard & smart work, and a solid distribution network, you’d be on your way to growing a successful business from sourcing plastic bottle recyclables.
If you want to collaborate, and help us to remove plastic, join us a volunteer or support through one of our products.
The sale of our cleaning up t-shirts allows us to fund these activities and spread awareness in Africa and the world about the plastic crisis and the mismanagement of waste. We will share with you the information of the events and you could be participate on our journey to improve plastic crisis on Ghana.
MAKE POSSIBLE FUTURE EVENTS
MAKE POSSIBLE FUTURE EVENTS
The sale of our cleaning up t-shirts allows us to fund these activities and spread awareness in Africa and the world about plastic crisis.