RECOUP, Durham County Council and Marmax Recycled Products have come together to challenge students in the Northeast to design products that can be made from recycled plastic.   The designs should solve some challenges to enable plastics recycling to be more convenient, whether at home, on the go, or enabling plastics that have been littered to be captured from the natural environment.     

There are 2 competition categories; – 

Entrants must be AGED 11 or under at the time of entry. 

Entrants must be AGED 18 or under at the time of entry.   

All entrants must include details of the education establishment that the entrant is a student of.    

There will be a winning entry in each category, each of which will receive an item/product made from recycled plastic for their school or college. The top 2 entrants in each category will receive a goodie bag of products made from recycled plastics from plastics recycling charity RECOUP.    

Entries will be judged by a panel of industry experts and local council representatives.    

This design challenge is aimed at inspiring students and communities to recycle more and educate on the practical challenges of infrastructure.   The products designed should be practical and able to be manufactured from recycled plastic. 

DESIGN CHALLENGE  

Design a product that can either go inside the home to help people separate plastics bottles, pots tubs, trays, and plastic bags and wrappings for recycling from their home.    

OR 

Design a product that can be used at work, in schools or colleges or commercial premises to separate plastics for recycling.   This should consider the fact that bottles may be collected via a deposit return scheme in England within the next few years.    

All designs should be able to be made from pre-formed recycled plastic sheeting and planking.   Such planking and sheeting can be cut, shaped, drilled, and screwed to form a range of products such as those that can be seen on the Marmax website www.marmaxproducts.co.uk 

For more information visit the website https://www.durhamrecycles.co.uk/schools-competition/  

COMPETITION OPENS Monday 17th July 2023 and closes Monday 20th November 2023 

WINNERS to be announced week commencing Monday 11th December 2023