The City of The Hague was the first partner to kick off the plastic waste collection in 2020 and continues with a second collection round! This year The Hague starts early (in July 2021) with highly motivated beach pavilions. The beach in The Hague is not only the eye catcher of the city, but also breathes an atmosphere of responsible entrepreneurship and sustainability.

Ten beach pavilions have started last week with the first plastic separation. Bins are provided by the PlastiCity project to facilitate the entrepreneurs on the beach. After solving some small challenges, all the beach pavilions are separating all their plastics, an amazing result! The businesses separate the plastic waste into two streams: (clean) foils and ‘rigid plastics’ by using colored bags. This helps the upcycling process in the recycling unit. Also this year the plastics will be transported to Ghent due to the COVID-19 restrictions. Despite that fact, the city of The Hague is now halfway carrying out the project.

Lessons learned

After the first collection round in 2020, The Hague had learned some valuable lessons. For example, not all plastic waste can be recycled (yet) and that those challenges still need to addressed. Simultaneously, there were also positive results, such as the happiness of businesses being able to (finally) separate their plastic waste. Also, the Resource bike (electric cargo bike) is very convenient for reaching businesses quick and easy without putting more pressure on city logistics in The Hague.

What’s next?

From September onwards, all interested businesses in The Hague are invited to  hand in their plastic waste. The plastic waste collection will take place until December and the plastics are then processed in the PlastiCity mobile recycling unit. In the meantime, The Hague will organize a design workshop to discuss with businesses which products can be made of their plastics.