Reycling giant Viridor is to process thousands of tonnes of glass waste produced in Tayside at its newly upgraded Scottish plant.
The company, part of the FTSE 250-listed Pennon Group and the UK’s largest recycling company in its own right, said its Newhouse facility at Motherwell had secured a new Scottish procurement contract covering five local authorities.
A total of 10,500 tonnes of glass products from households in Perth & Kinross, Dundee and Angus as well as from the Borders and West Lothian will be recycled at the facility each year under the terms of the new contract.
The £25 million Newhouse site has recently undergone a £1m upgrade to meet the high-quality cullet glass standards required by Scottish bottlemakers as they create new glassware.
A proportion of the recycled glass is used to service increased demand for bottles from Scotland’s growing whisky and gin sectors.
Viridor said the local authority contract was initially for two years with the potential for a further two one-year extensions.
Paul Brown, Viridor’s managing director of recycling and integrated assets, said the contract win was “a significant step in ensuring the company was able to supply the level of feedstock needed by the Scottish remelt sector, especially to address increasing demand in the whisky and gin sector.