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Biffa Sponsors Playtex Moonwalk

25th January 2006

Biffa are proud to be chosen as the waste contractor for the Playtex Moonwalk, which will take place on the night of Saturday 20th May 2006 in Hyde Park - London.

The Moonwalk is the only power walking marathon of it's kind, where women (and men!) wear decorative bras to raise money for breast cancer research and cancer care.

The Playtex Moonwalkers will consume approximately 70,000 bottles of mineral water in one night. These bottles will be collected by Biffa and taken away for recycling.

As one of the UK's leading environmental waste management companies, Biffa is at the forefront of providing cost effective solutions for businesses waste problems. Over the next 3 years the current methods of waste collection will all but disappear. Segregation, treatment and landfill diversion will become the norm as costs rise and legislation bites.

Why recycle? whether at home or at work, it is easy to think that the small part you play has no effect and why bother. Well the answer is that every bit helps and by doing it yourself it encourages others and helps to make it more cost effective.

Statistics

We produce and use 20 times more plastic today than we did 50 years ago!

Every year food shops in the British Isles give away roughly 8 billion plastic carrier bags. This represents over 65,000 tonnes of plastic – enough to cover the whole of London with a layer of bags.

Plastic production uses 8% of the worlds oil production, oil comes from the earth. By recycling plastic we use 95% less energy than would if made from virgin materials.

The UK consumes nearly 5 million tonnes of plastic products each year

53% of products are packaged in plastic.

1 tonne of plastic = 22,000 2 litre drink bottles or 120,000 carrier bags.

Recycling just 1 plastic bottle can save the amount of energy needed to power a 60W light bulb for up to 6 hours.

An estimated 9.2 billion plastic bottles are disposed of each year.

The quantity of plastic bottles collected for recycling has doubled since 2002.

On average, every household uses 373 plastic bottles each year of which just 29 are recycled.

11% of household waste is plastic, 40% of which is plastic bottles.

25 recycled PET bottles can be used to make an adult's fleece jacket.

Up to 40% less fuel is used to transport drinks in plastic bottles compared to glass bottles.

Plastic packaging uses only around 2% of all crude oil produced.

Source: Recoup