Veka crowned NFA Recycling Champion

The National Fenestration Awards has named Veka UK as the overall winner in the 2019 Recycling category, Veka Recycling is the arm of the ‘Veka family’ responsible for processing end-of-life PVC-U windows and virgin offcuts back into raw materials ready for manufacture. 

Veka Recycling MD Simon Scholes explains that this operation is not only for Veka customers, but for all brands of PVC-U systems: “We don’t care where it comes from, we care where it’s going!

“We work incredibly hard to make sure that PVC-U doesn’t end up in landfill. And there’s no reason it should; we can process it to such a level of quality that it can go back into new window and door frames, effectively closing the loop on the process.

“I’m delighted that we’ve won our category of the 2019 National Fenestration Awards. Apparently there were more than 350 nominations submitted this year, and 5565 votes cast to decide the eventual winners, so to have been recognised and rewarded in such a huge campaign is really something to be proud of.

“Last year, Veka Recycling moved from Kent to our new 5.7 acre Wellingborough site, with investment of more than £8m. This created more than 50 new jobs for people in the area and means we have the capacity to recycle a potential 25,000 tonnes of PVC-U per year. Ongoing investment and development means the plant has the potential to become Europe’s most technically advanced specialist window recycling facility. 

“The beauty of the service for fabricators and installers is that we make it as easy as possible – you don’t even need to remove gaskets, hinges or hardware. We accept previously installed frames as well as virgin offcuts, and we reduce them and then transfer component materials for further reduction and separation. PVC-U is then further processed at Wellingborough and returned to market for re-manufacture.

“The Wellingborough plant is the third to be built by Veka Umwelttechnik GmbH, the specialist recycling subsidiary of the global Veka Group. The family-owned group pioneered PVC-U recycling in Europe with its first plant opening in Behringen, Germany back in 1993, and then another in France in 2006. The combined capacity of the three plants is set to exceed 100,000 tonnes of PVC-U windows a year.

“The investment in plant and technology at Wellingborough is a clear sign of Veka Group’s commitment to sustainability and to the UK market. The whole Veka Group is well known for being a responsible and ‘safe pair of hands’ right from innovative new product design, to sustainably processing and recycling windows that have seen better days.

“In Veka’s 50^th year, it’s a real pleasure to have not only been shortlisted, but to have been named the winner in an Awards campaign that is based on the genuine votes of our industry, rather than a small panel of judges. It confirms to me once again, that we’re on just the right track in supporting customers.”