Sustainable detergent brand Ecover already encourages its customers to refill their old bottles rather than throw them out, but now it has taken another step towards reducing the environmental impact of its packaging with a new plastic that has been recycled from ocean waste.

 

Ecover's new Ocean Bottle is made from 100 per cent recycled plastic, one tenth of which is collected from the mountains of plastic waste floating in the sea that pose a threat to sea birds, fish, and marine mammals.

 

The new venture is helping to provide a market for plastic collected through Waste Free Oceans (WFO), a public-private Foundation that pays fisherman to collect waste plastic for recycling.

 

The material is then sent to Closed Loop Recycling's plant in Dagenham, where it is processed and recycled into new plastic to make the new Ecover bottles.

 

Ecover is currently only using the Ocean Bottle to package washing up liquid, but in the longer term hopes to expand the product line.

 

However, Philip Malmberg, chief executive of Ecover, said that in order to do this, the recycling supply chain needed to grow.

 

Ecover has now joined Closed Loop and drinks giant Coca-Cola Enterprises in calling for the government to help expand the plastic recycling industry.

 

"Our ocean plastic bottle is just one small step on the way to solving the problem, but you've got to start somewhere - what we need now is to create a wider network of fishermen, recycling facilities and manufacturers to really make this happen," said Malmberg in a statement.

 

"We also have to exploit existing supply chains and make it as easy as possible for manufacturers to use ocean plastic. At the moment the will is there but it's just too much effort for many manufacturers to make it work."