Recycling paper and card video transcript

Video transcript for the recycling paper and card video on how we recycle your waste page.

[Title card] Recycling paper and card. Kent Councils working together to keep Kent clean.

The presenter is wearing hard hat, goggles and high-viz jacket standing in front of a large pile of used card and paper in a warehouse area of a paper mill.

Presenter: All the paper and card you recycle is used to make paper-based packaging here in the UK and all that starts right here at this paper mill in Snodland, Kent.

The video shows the outside of the paper mill then the machinery and control room inside.

Presenter: The mill runs 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. Recycling in Kent for Kent.

A large lorry is reversing into a recycling depot and emptying a load of paper card.

Presenter: After your recycling is collected, the different materials get separated. With 130 tonnes of paper and card arriving at this recycling depot each day.

The paper and card is being moved around, and workers are wearing gloves and using rakes to check through it.

Presenter: The team starts by removing anything that isn't paper or card by hand. Otherwise it will contaminate the recycling. Plastics, polystyrene, wet paper and cardboard and even nappies have been found here and can only be removed manually. Sometimes the team has to deal with dangerous items too, putting them at risk. If all of these items are not removed, then whole loads of card and paper will get rejected. And this has financial and environmental impacts. The remaining card and paper is sorted and compressed into 800 kilogram bales.

There are huge bales stacked up outside, and a forklift truck is loading them onto a lorry.

Presenter: These bales are then transported to the mill where they'll be turned into reels of recycled paper.

Paper and card is moving up a conveyor belt, going from outside to inside the mill.

Presenter: First, the bales travel up a conveyor belt to the top floor of the mill.

Shredded paper and card are pouring into a large vat of water.

Presenter: The paper and card are mixed with water in this pulper, which acts like a huge food blender. 40 tonnes of paper is processed every hour. Now your average piece of paper, or card can be recycled approximately 7 times before the paper fibres become too weak to be reused. But even then, they don't go to waste. The fibres are collected and the water is squeezed out, making a solid product.

A worker in a paper mill is watching as a grey-brown paste comes out of a machine, and crumbles it in her hands to show a grainy consistency.

Presenter: This gets used for things like composting, meaning 100% of the paper and card that arrives is recycled.

The presenter walks up to a huge machine with a person who works at the mill and up a ladder to see the equipment in the mill.

Presenter: The usable paper mixture is sprayed onto giant sheets of fabric and is put through a huge press which squeezes out more water to make the sheet of paper exactly the right thickness or weight to make cardboard boxes.

The presenter and worker then walk along next to the machine looking at the different parts of it.

Presenter: The pressed sheet then needs to be dried further in these huge ovens called dryers. The heat in this room is incredible and reaches up to 105 degrees. It's the heat that dries the wet sheet pulp into the final product. Starch is added at this point to give the paper strength.

At the end of the machine there is a huge reel of brown paper.

Presenter: The paper is initially wound into huge reels, each weighing 35 tonnes, which is the equivalent of 6 adult elephants. And from here, it is cut down into smaller reels for the next stage.

The presenter is now in a control room, with lots of screens and 2 people working in there.

Presenter: The whole of the paper making process is managed from this control room, where every single aspect of the system is tightly monitored. And importantly, the mill follows strict guidance set and monitored by the Environment Agency. So the vapor you see coming from the chimneys is steam, not smoke.

Back in the mill the machines are moving the reels to where they are stored.

Presenter: The smaller reels then travel downstairs and are stored in this warehouse, ready to be taken across the UK to become corrugated cardboard and other paper-based products.

The presenter is in the warehouse with large reels.

Presenter: It takes just one hour to produce a 35 tonne reel. So in 24 hours this mill makes about 800 tonnes of paper and card.

The presenter is standing outside the paper mill.

Presenter: So there you have it. Put all of your card and paper recycling collection and it will be recycled and back in use in a couple of weeks.

[Title card] Kent Resource Partnership logo. Keep Kent Clean logo.