A FIRM from the North-East is helping businesses scale the fridge mountain with one of the UK's first fully approved recycling units.

Designed to deal with the thousands of large chiller cabinets and freezer units disposed of each year by supermarkets and shops, the new facility allows for the recycling of all components plus the safe removal of ozone-depleting chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs).

European legislation has reclassified fridges as hazardous waste because of the CFCs used in each unit's insulating foam. It is no longer allowed to simply get rid of the fridges in landfill sites.

Chris Musgrave, chairman of JCM Group, in Billingham, the company behind the initiative, said: "We can process more than 6,000 fridges a year.

"Everyone has been concentrating on ways to deal with domestic fridges but the retail sector is also facing a major problem and has to cope with much bigger individual units which require an initial dismantling process."

On a ten-acre industrial site at the town's Cowpen Industrial Estate, where the company has its head office, units have been constructed to accommodate the fridge recycling process.

JCM, which employs about 200 people, has already won orders from supermarket firms Tesco, Somerfield and Budgen and has just received its official licence from the Environment Agency - one of the first companies in the UK to do so.

Mr Musgrave said: "Our service is now fully operational and we will increase the size of our premises and add to our workforce as the demand builds up.

"I anticipate that by early next year we will have created another 30 jobs.

"We can also evaluate if the units actually need to be scrapped or if they can be refurbished or reused.

"We already operate on a national basis and therefore have the infrastructure and transport systems to make this a viable and cost-effective service."

Costs for handling each unit will vary from £60 to £100 depending on quantities and size.

Information on the fridge recycling service can be obtained from the JCM Group on (01642) 566003.

Problems with disposal are being overcome

LOCAL authorities across the region are beginning to get a grip on the fridge mountain caused by European recycling regulations.

Across the country, a million fridges were stockpiled in warehouses and fields as the new rules came into force this year.

Durham County Council spent around £300,000 transporting old fridges to Germany to be recycled earlier this year.

Across Teesside, and in particular Stockton, the figure is around 6,500 old fridges and freezers currently waiting to be disposed of.

A spokeswoman for Stockton Borough Council said: "There has been a tiny increase, but it is not a major problem.

"We do not have old fridges and freezers lying around in fields, and the problem is being dealt with. Anybody from Teesside who has an appliance they want to get rid of can bring it to the civic amenity site at Haverton Hill."

However, in North Yorkshire, more than 17,000 fridges are being kept in a storage unit at Hessay, near York, on behalf of North Yorkshire County Council and York City Council.

A spokesman from Yorwaste, which manages the site, said it was looking at ways of reducing the mountain and was considering exporting the fridges to Germany or transporting them to decommissioning plants in Britain.

He said people wishing to get rid of old fridges and freezers could do so free of charge at any recycling centre in North Yorkshire.