ERP Italia, Collection System for the management on the entire national territory of WEEE, WBA and of worn-out photovoltaic modules, has chosen to communicate the results of the service carried out in 2014 on behalf of Electrolux Professional: over 260 collections in regime of 1:1 with 100% of positive outcome and 95% compliance with average intervention times.
Quantified in concrete terms, the service has led to the collection and treatment of over 50 tons of professional WEEE belonging to the typologies R1 (refrigerators, professional cold stores) and R2 (washing machines, dishwashers and professional ovens), in the proportion of about 24 tons of WEEE R1 and 26 tons of WEEE R2.
The collection of professional WEEE at the service life end was accomplished by shopping centres, hotel and restaurant kitchens, cooking centres of canteens and collective catering services, hotel training institutes and service centres in all Italy.
The evaluation of the environmental impact of the service is feasible if we consider that the treatment of each refrigerator generates on average 60% of steel, 24% of different plastic typologies, 3% of copper and aluminium and 1% of glass, coolant and oil. Translated into numbers, from professional WEEE of type R1 in one year they recovered 14.4 tons of steel, 5.7 tons of plastics, 7.2 quintals of copper and aluminium and 2.4 quintals of glass, coolant and oil altogether.
Likewise, from the recycling of each dishwasher and washing machine it is possible to draw on average 58.6% of ferrous metals, 5.3% of non-ferrous metals, 5.6% of plastic materials with the addition of 7.5% of metal fractions, 8.2% of other components like copper, glass and rubber and 14.8% of ground residues.
Therefore, from professional WEEE of type R2 they recovered 15.2 tons of ferrous metals, 1.3 tons of non-ferrous metals, 1.4 tons of plastics, 1.9 tons of metal fractions, 2.1 tons of copper, glass and rubber and 3.8 tons of ground residues.
The figures communicated by ERP Italia and Electrolux Professional have the merit of demonstrating in transparent and objective manner how today the service of collection and treatment of WEEE in modality 1 against 1 already plays a relevant role both in economic terms, introducing huge quantities of recycled raw materials into the productive cycle, and in terms of saving of environmental resources.
