WELSH GOVERNMENT SUPPORTS EXPANSION OF NET REGENERATION SCHEME®

Welsh Government supports expansion of Net Regeneration Scheme® to offer free recycling of fishing gear to the Welsh fishing community. Globally only 9% of plastic waste is recycled; 12% is incinerated, whilst the remaining 79% is either sent to landfill, stockpiled in developing countries or dumped on land or in the marine environment. The UN expects the amount of plastic in oceans to treble in the next 20 years. All this is not due to the lack of recyclability but a lack of recycling infrastructure and consumer demand. For this reason, Odyssey Innovation has been pioneering new solutions to prevent further ocean plastic pollution by offering support to the fishing community, beach clean groups, governmental bodies and eco-warriors alike through various free sustainable incentives.

In response to the threat caused by the marine litter crisis Welsh Government has teamed up with the marine waste specialist firm Odyssey Innovation Ltd, creators of the Net Regeneration
Scheme, in an unprecedented project for the Welsh fishing communities to offer a sustainable solution for end of life fishing gear such as whelk pots, buoys, ropes, net, floating pontoons and
any other recyclable plastics.

Odyssey Innovation’s Net Regeneration Scheme is the only scheme in the UK that offers free net recycling solutions of Polyethylene trawl, Nylon and other plastic generated and recovered
by the fishing industry. Everything that can be recycled in the UK is recycled locally and we use specialist recyclers in Europe to recycle any problematic materials. To date, the scheme
supports the ambitions of more than 60 stakeholders (companies, harbours, fisherfolk and charities) to adopt a best practice approach to waste disposal which is fully traceable and award-winning.https://vimeo.com/user100904624

The Net Regeneration Scheme has additional benefits in reducing CO2 by putting recycled plastic back into the economy, which has a significant CO2 saving over using new virgin plastic. It covers the cost of transporting the gear to plastics recyclers and closes the ‘recycling loop’ by converting the plastic waste back into products such as kayaks, surfing hand-planes, tote boxes and recycling bins.

Throughout the years, and thanks to the support of several grants, Odyssey Innovation has been able to invest in the appropriate infrastructure (skips, bins, salaries, marketing, logistics) to
scale its operations that were once restricted to a few harbours in Cornwall. The desire for positive change, particularly amongst the fishing industry, has been palpable in most cases. A
strategic long term partnership with Exeter City Council’s Materials Recovery Facility (MRF) has also broadened Odyssey Innovation’s horizons by providing excellent collections services, state-of-the-art premises with facilities for processing and storing vast amounts of waste and most recently a part-investment in an industrial shredder to produce a marine plastic granulate which is now for sale and has an infinite and exciting amount of applications.

To date one can find 3 large skips placed at Exeter City Council, Trevisker Garden Centre and Newlyn further supplemented by 15 large wheelie bins at Circular & Co -Perranporth, Surfers
Against Sewage-St Agnes, Lost Gardens of Heligan, Ilfracombe, Milford Haven, Fishguard, Holyhead, Cardigan, Weymouth x3, Sutton x 2, Newquay, Mevagissey, Looe and Falmouth for
community members to use, free of charge.

With funding from the Welsh Government, Odyssey Innovation are rolling out a pilot Net Regeneration Scheme along the Welsh coastline and would like to invite members of the fishing
community and harbours interested in participating to get in touch. Implementation dates are set to Tuesday 12th October for bin drop offs in Holyhead, Cardigan and Amlwch whilst Milford
Haven and Fishguard will see their facilities dropped off on Wednesday 13th October.

Seafish, the public body that supports the seafood industry in the UK, has offered in-kind support on behalf of Welsh Government and the Welsh fishing industry to help facilitate the project. Having previously worked in the South West with Odyssey Innovation, the organisation is delighted to be supporting this new initiative.

Other recent illustrious news includes the Net Regeneration Scheme being chosen as a major data providing partner in the EU Interreg project ‘INdiGO’ whilst also winning a government
tender to carry out recycling schemes across Wales. It was selected by BVRIO from 214 recycling ventures around the world to initiate a plastic credits scheme and was consulted by MRAG and the European Commission to assist in developing a framework for extended producer responsibility schemes.

To date, Odyssey Innovation has successfully recovered and/or diverted over 200,000 kilograms of plastic from landfill and incineration and from entering into the marine environment; all of
which have been recycled successfully. The scheme also ticks 8 of the UN’s Goals for Sustainable Development.