Surfers and Mermaid celebrate as plastics factory makes the right moves

Today a merry mermaid accompanied clean water campaigners from Surfers Against Sewage (SAS) to celebrate as Contico Europe Limited agreed to become the first UK factory to adopt actions from a new manual into their current Continuous Improvement programme. The manual is promoting methods to stop plastic pellets entering the water environment from poor housekeeping practices at injection moulding factories.

SAS gave Contico Europe Limited a dossier, entitled, 'Operation Clean Sweep', a US manual, created by the American Chemical Council and SPI, the Plastics Industry Trade Association. It was born out of an escalating environmental concern that plastic resin pellets, or 'mermaids tears' as they have been nicknamed, are polluting the world's oceans and shorelines. Contico Europe Limited, one of the South West's largest plastic manufacturers, recognised the environmental and financial benefits outlined in the manual and will be implementing new measures to improve the factory's performance.

SAS campaigners presented Greg Wood, Operations Manager at Contico Europe Ltd with a copy of the dossier and SAS's merry mermaid presented Greg Wood with a kiss.

Earlier this year an SAS investigation highlighted plastic resin pellets littering some of the regions finest beaches in there thousands. Click here for more information.

To the untrained eye they are almost unnoticeable but taking a closer look at the tide line reveals the 5mm sized pellets can be seen everywhere. Indeed they are now recognised as the 2nd most common form of litter around the UK coastline. (source: MCS Beachwatch 2007).

While there are believed to be several routes, which can lead to the pellets becoming beach litter, SAS were concerned that a lack of pellet containment on factory sites is leading the pellets to be blown or washed into storm drains. Once here it is easy for the pellets to enter the water environment and then run off into streams, to then enter the sea.

Covert footage from SAS investigators highlighted this particular route of escape for pellets, when we examined 3 other Cornish injection moulding factory sites in June. Sadly, since then we have not seen any reduction in mermaid's tears on the beach.

SAS have been lobbying the British Plastic Federation (BPF) for an industry-wide code of practice to be adopted in the UK, which is based on the US 'Operation Clean Sweep' manual. Despite the BPF having the 'Operation Clean Sweep' document for over a year, the BPF has not adopted such a code. However, SAS are hopeful that now Contico Europe Limited are leading the industry with this excellent manual the BPF will speed up the release of their own version. This could kick-start clean up operations all over the UK, desperately needed to help protect the coastline from this kind of litter.

ANDY CUMMINS, SAS Campaign Manager says: "Though these pellets are remarkably small, their impacts are remarkably big. We'd like to see all plastic factories following Conitico Europe Limited's lead and adopt a 'zero pellet loss plan' and this dossier can help them achieve it with cheap and simple measures, such as ensuring all storm drains are fitted with catch trays. Not only does it help the plastic factories environmental performance but it will also save them money. We now urge the BPF to take the lead and release a UK version immediately".

MARTIN MARRON, Contico Europe Limited says: "Obviously Contico Europe Limited wants to improve efficiency, especially during the current financial climate, but we also strive to reduce our environmental impact wherever possible. I'd like to thank SAS and their lovely mermaid for delivering this manual and I hope other factories follow our lead and adopt these measures."

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