THE North-East’s largest independent recycling company has recorded its highest amount of material processed ever in January 2020.

Last month saw a 48 per cent growth of material processed at J&B Recycling’s Windermere Road site in Hartlepool from the same month last year.

In 2014 J&B received a £7.5m investment from the Business Growth Fund (BGF) which enabled the company to begin its focus on process optimisation and expansion within the company that has been undertaken over the last five years.

Mark Penny, Commercial Manager at J&B Recycling, said: “The continued investment into our recycling centres and MRF means we will continue to increase the amount of recyclable materials we can process and deliver the highest quality material available.”

“We are continually upgrading plant equipment to add flexibility to our operations with the most advanced technology that is on offer to the waste industry.”

J&B’s recent success comes at a time when the recycling market is suffering an overall 50 per cent decrease in the value of the finished product of recycled materials per tonne.

J&B’s increased investment has ensured the business can process the materials to the highest specification required for the strict restrictions imposed in the export markets.

The company invested heavily in process engineering and process optimisation techniques used predominately in the oil and gas and petrochemicals industries and not typically applied in the waste industry.

Its Hartlepool plant had three major upgrades over the last year and has plans for a further upgrade this year to maximise productivity. These upgrades have boosted capacity by 60 per cent and have delivered contamination levels under 0.5 per cent for all its fibre grades.

The company has recently opened a new recycling centre in Washington; the facility services Sunderland City Council’s kerbside recycling contract amongst others and provides J&B with the potential for further recycling contracts in the region.

The firm sells its product across the globe - including Europe and Asia, but much of its product is retained here in the UK.