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First study visit in Madrid

One key element of the IMPACTPapeRec project is the organisation of study visits to allow partners to get a taste of the current situation in the targeted countries. This series of study visit started with a study visit to Madrid in early March to learn about the paper collection scheme in Spain. The visit to Spain was very interesting for the start of the project as it represents a best practice for paper waste collection. It was also the perfect opportunity to get to know the collection system implemented at retailer and project partner Carrefour Spain. The study visit was organised by the project partners Saica and Carrefour and joined by ITENE, ACR+, Hamburger Recycling, and CEPI.

The study visit commenced in a Carrefour city market in the heart of Madrid, where participants got introduced to the commercial paper and cardboard waste collection. Before heading to a Carrefour hypermarket on the outskirts of Madrid they furthermore looked at the combination of Door-to-Door collection and bring banks for households and small shops. At the Carrefour hypermarket, Guillermo Valles from Saica, as well as Mariano Rodriguez and Rafael Herrero from Carrefour also took the time to explain the Spanish system more in detail to the project partners.

In the afternoon the visit continued with a visit to the Carpa sorting plant, where paper and cardboard coming from the household collection in bring bank system is sorted out into deinking grades in one stream and brown grades in another stream. Combined with the visit to the neighbouring paper mill of Holmen Paper this further deepened the participants’ knowledge on the local and national context of paper waste collection and recycling. The meeting concluded with an extensive discussion session on the next steps ahead in the project; including the data collection from municipalities and best practices cases, and the definition of key performance indicators.