A study by resource management company Veolia has revealed that more than half of the consumers in the UK would pay more for a product with recycled packaging.

Conducted by YouGov, the study noted that nearly 51% would prefer a new drink in a recyclable bottle.

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Among the respondents, 15.6% stated that they would definitely buy the new drink with a recyclable bottle.

Another 30% consider recycling an important determinant while purchasing a drink.

“This would save approximately 300,000t of materials and we’d be well on our way to being a truly sustainable society.”

The findings were released concurrently with the official opening of Veolia’s Dagenham Plastics Facility that will make recycled plastic.

Veolia UK and Ireland senior executive vice-president Estelle Brachlianoff said: “In the UK, we fail to capture 44% of all of the plastic bottles we use but imagine if we collected and recycled all of these.

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“This would save approximately 300,000t of materials and we’d be well on our way to being a truly sustainable society.

“I’m a firm believer that the solution to making all plastics easily recyclable and increasing the percentage of recycled material in packaging lies in collaboration.”

Veolia’s new plastics facility is capable of producing nearly 10,000t of quality food grade HDPE pellets a year.

The plant uses approximately 200 million plastic milk bottles to make the product.

HDPE pellets require 75% less energy compared to using conventional materials to make a plastic bottle that can eliminate 10,000t of carbon emissions per annum.

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