EMR, one of the world’s largest metal recycling companies has made a significant commitment to remaining in its existing Tilbury Dock facility. Not only has it just signed a new 25 year lease with the Port of Tilbury, it will be upgrading its facilities and investing around £3m in improved ship loading equipment, the company said in its press release.
The site plays an important role in EMR’s activities in the South East of England. It acts as an export hub for the company’s numerous depots around London and handles over 1 million tonnes of UK-produced scrap metal, mainly iron and steel, every year. The processed scrap metal, whose origin could be from end-of-life products as diverse as railway tracks to the steel from shredded cars, is loaded on to vessels that can carry up to 42,000 tonnes at a time and be transported to destinations as far away as India or Korea.
The environmental benefits of metal recycling are enormous and help to conserve the world’s scarce resources. Using recycled metal to produce new steel as opposed to it being made from new ore, saves 1.5 tonnes of carbon dioxide for every tonne of steel produced. Today in excess of 30% of new steel is produced from recycled metal.