Move to put plastics recycling at heart of cable management specification 

Sustainability Mon, Aug 6, 2018 9:54 AM

Market-leading cable management manufacturer Marshall-Tufflex is calling on specifiers and contractors to join it in driving up the sector’s eco credentials by specifying and installing PVC-U trunking solutions with a minimum content of 50% recycled plastic – and say no to single use plastics.

The British company wants to put plastics recycling at the heart of specification and purchasing decisions in an effort to divert the amount of waste plastic going to landfill and ease demand for oil-rich virgin PVC.

“Our ultimate goal is for all PVC-U cable management specifications to state that systems should be manufactured from a minimum of 50% recycled plastic,” said Marshall-Tufflex CEO Paul Hetherington.

“We want to start the conversation throughout the supply chain, from architects to end-user clients, encouraging everyone to make more informed decisions when selecting, buying, installing and using PVC-U trunking systems. We take our impact on the environment seriously and want the rest of the sector to join us; we’d like to see the whole plastics cable management industry reduce reliance on single use plastics and recycle as much as possible,” he added.

Marshall-Tufflex has long used recycled plastics in its market-leading solutions, the high quality of this material is one of the reasons the company leads the industry. Due to investing in advanced technology, the company has been able to push the recycled content of all its manufactured PVC-U products to 80% (latest annual statistics for May 2017 to April 2018), with some products produced from 100% recycled material.

“It’s a little-known fact that Marshall-Tufflex has been using recycled plastics in the manufacturing process for more than 20 years, with some of our products made from 100% recycled material, which is great news for both customers and the planet,” said Mr Hetherington.

“We hope our drive to encourage the market to use products with a high recycled PVC content will encourage other manufacturers to up their recycling and reuse efforts. At the moment we stop the equivalent in weight of 300 double decker buses of PVC-U going to landfill each year. If more cable management producers joined us we could double or treble that amount, which would make a terrific impact on the environmental performance of our sector and really contribute towards a circular economy,” Mr Hetherington added.

The company, which produces more than 16 million metres of PVC-U cable management annually at its manufacturing plant in Hastings, East Sussex, has worked closely with recycling partners to secure high grade recycled plastic sourced from the window fabrication industry (manufacturing off-cuts are re-chipped for recycling). Because it is window grade, the raw material is stronger and more robust than virgin extrusion grade PVC-U cable management material.

Mr Hetherington continued: “We have worked closely with our recycling partners over the past few years to produce a sustainable, recycled material ideal for manufacturing cable management products. Our focus has been on quality and testing to maximise the recycled content which also improves the quality of our products. It’s a programme that has worked extremely well and we are very proud to now be using such high levels of recycled material.”

Marshall-Tufflex is the UK’s leading manufacturer of cable management solutions. Company founder Harold Cirket pioneered plastic extrusion in the UK more than 75 years ago and his spirit of research, development and innovation remains at the heart of the business.

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