Material Focus: Recycle Your Electricals campaign and funding opportunities.
Almost all of us have unwanted or broken electricals lying around or have considered binning them. In fact, discarded electricals are the fastest-growing source of waste in the UK – and the world – with over 100,000 tonnes binned every year in the UK and a further 880 million unwanted gadgets gathering dust in our homes. That’s an average of 30 per household!
But unwanted electricals aren’t actually waste. These electricals contain valuable materials like copper, lithium and gold which can be reused and turned into anything from solar panels to life-saving equipment.
Recycle Your Electricals: Humans of Scotland!
Material Focus, an independent not-for-profit organisation, is on a mission to ensure the materials inside our electricals are never wasted. Their nationwide Recycle Your Electricals campaign raises awareness that anything with a plug, battery, or cable can and should always be reused or recycled, and makes it easy by pointing you towards your local drop-off points.
It’s super easy – just bag up your unwanted and broken electricals and pop your postcode into Recycle Your Electricals’ Locator to find one of 27,000 donate, repair, reuse and recycling points across the UK. Together, we can save valuable materials from being lost to landfill!
Material Focus offers a range of communication assets to help communities find their nearest recycling options whilst also helping spread awareness on why electricals should never be binned. This includes digital assets as well as posters, leaflets and banners – which can be found here.
Funding Opportunities
Material Focus doesn’t just raise awareness – they also fund real solutions to make electrical recycling more accessible for everyone across the UK, including Scotland.
Through their Electricals Recycling Fund, they’ve supported over 60 projects from Aberdeen to Dorset, supporting kerbside collection schemes, drop-off points in community centres, schools and libraries, and innovative solutions that make it easier for the UK to repair, reuse or recycle their electricals.
Join us at the April webinar! Sign up to our webinar with Eco-Congregation Scotland and the Scottish Episcopal Church’s Net Zero Team on Thursday 10th April at 1pm to hear more about how you can get involved in the Recycle Your Electricals campaign, and help promote sustainability within faith-based communities. Please register for the online meeting link here.