Recycling nappies - wouldn't be my favourite job

Here's a new one: a company called Knowaste in Birmingham is setting up a plant specifically to recycle nappies. We have long advocated the use of washable nappies because of the environmental impact of disposable ones in landfill sites. Knowaste has come up with a process that allows the disposable variety of nappy to be recycled. Good for them.

The process involves three key stages:

1. Used nappies and/or incontinence products are collected and transported to a Knowaste processor or plant.
2. The Knowaste process washes the nappy material and mechanically separates the individual components so the super absorbent polymers, wood pulp and plastic can be recycled
3. The reclaimed components - pulp fibres, super absorbent polymers, and plastic components can be made into recycled products

These facts about disposable nappies come from the Knowaste website:

• In the UK around 8 million disposable nappies are used every day and one baby's disposable nappies fill 40 black sacks in a year
• At least four-and-a-half trees are needed to produce the disposable nappies for one baby
  Disposable nappies may take up to 500 years to decompose, essentially making them present in our landfills forever
• For every tonne of nappy waste recycled, 400kg of wood, 145 cubic metres of natural gas and 8,700 cubic metres of water is saved

The Knowaste plant is a great step forward, but please don't pick me to work there.