Fundraising to expand our single use plastic recycling operation
Some ‘Wednesday Wombles’ sorting crisp packets pre covid
Bigger and better: Appeal for help to expand our single use plastic recycling operation and deliver a greener Horsham!
After a quiet start to the lockdown on the single use plastic recycling front, we are delighted to say that things are starting to pick up again and we are receiving increasing donations of single use plastics waste resources at the Quaker Meeting House drop off point. This is brilliant news as we want to make sure we’re diverting as much single use plastic household waste away from landfill and incineration, and finding new purposes for these materials through our TerraCycle recycling scheme.
We are extremely lucky to have our small but dedicated team of volunteers (affectionately known as the Wombles!) who throughout the lockdown have continued to sort through the donations on a weekly basis in a socially distanced manner. However as waste resource donations return to pre lockdown levels, SGL is in desperate need of support to expand its recycling capability. To give some indication of the quantities the team are working through, a staggering 120,000 crisp packets have been recycled by our team over the course of the last two years! Once single plastic donations are dropped off at the Quaker Meeting House, these are sorted through by hand by our volunteers, boxed up and sent to a company called TerraCycle who manage the recycling of these hard to recycle materials. Without these volunteers, crisp packets along with lots of other household single use plastic resources such as biscuit and snack wrappers would be discarded in waste bins, which currently are transported to Germany and Holland to be incinerated at significant financial and environmental cost.
Some of our ‘Wednesday Wombles’ kept going with social distance
Whilst our recycling initiative started small in 2012, we have now grown and operate (in normal times!) up to ten recycling drop off points across Horsham district. As the residents of Horsham begin to return to our drop off points to donate their recycling, it is becoming clear that our current storage system will soon be overwhelmed. Currently we use lots of storage bins which the Quakers have kindly allowed us to use to house recycling before sorting. In order to keep up with the increased capacity, the SGL really need a larger space to be constructed.
This is where we hope you will be able to help us! Having received permission from the church and a quote from a local contractor for the demolition of the old shed in the Unitarian grounds and the construction of a much larger hub, we are now keen to start this build and increase our recycling capabilities. This would be of great help to the whole SGL community, providing storage space for not only the recycling donations but also to store materials for the Horsham Repair Cafe and Horsham Climate Café when they are able to open again. In order to make this happen we need to raise £2k, and so are appealing to you our community alongside local businesses to help us to make this a reality. Over the last couple of weeks we have managed to raise £1200, so we just have £800 to go! If you are able to help in any way in terms of fundraising or individual donation, we and the Wombles would be extremely grateful, and you will be helping revolutionise the operation and work towards a greener Horsham!
For more information about our single-use plastic recycling scheme visit this page.
YOU CAN HELP US RECYCLE MORE AND HELP THE PLANET IN ANY OF THE FOLLOWING WAYS:
- Make a donation through The Giving Machine here.
- You can help raise money at no cost to yourself by using The Giving Machine to make online purchases, learn more here https://www.sussexgreenliving.org.uk/donate-to-help-us-at-no-cost-to-you/.
- You can download our gift aid form here. Gift Aid increases the value of donations by 25%, so it means even more money goes to the causes you care about – and it won’t cost you extra.
- Or through the Horsham District Community Lottery, £1 per week could win you £25k and help us with our climate emergency work!
Feeling inspired to get involved?
We are always looking for volunteers, so get in touch or come and meet us and see how you can get involved! Join us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, or sign up to receive our latest news (it only takes two seconds to add your email address – simply click on black ‘Follow‘ tab on bottom right of this screen!). Feel free to also send us an email using our contact form, or come and say hello at our events like the Horsham Climate Cafe or the Horsham Repair Cafe!
