In an age where consumers, companies and central banks are seeking to reduce raw materials use and close the loop on waste, banknote recycling has never been more important.
The reasons for this go beyond environmental impact alone. The cultural cachet of banknotes is such that they are often described as a nation’s business card, and this is apt: few products are more ubiquitous in everyday life.
Globally, there are approximately 550 billion banknotes in circulation, and every year, between 150 and 180 billion banknotes are produced to replenish them. By weight, this equates to roughly 153 thousand metric tonnes of spent banknotes annually.
Their end-of-life treatment can represent a particularly powerful declaration of our shared desire for a more sustainable future – but not all banknotes are created equal.
Rather than languishing in landfill or being incinerated, GUARDIAN banknotes are converted back into polypropylene pellets that are on-sold as a commodity input for use in durable, end-of-life products.
In Chile, for example, GUARDIAN banknotes become a material with properties similar to natural wood, which is used to make floors, roofs and furniture. And that’s just one example.
Globally, 80 per cent of central banks using GUARDIAN substrate recycle.
This represents a dividend on decades of investment and innovation by CCL Secure, in partnership with recyclers, printers and central banks. In 2015, we strengthened this commitment with the launch of the GUARDIAN Global Recycling Program, a network of regional recycling facilities strategically situated in key markets to support our goal of ‘zero waste’.
This groundbreaking initiative was recognised with a Central Banking Award for sustainable practices in 2021 – and followed a major direct infrastructure investment the year before.
In 2020, CCL Secure’s sister company, Innovia Films, launched a specialised recycling centre in Zacapu, Mexico. It was specifically designed to provide central bank customers with access to a simple, streamlined, and proven process for recycling spent banknotes across Latin America.
The Zacapu plant includes an area dedicated to banknote processing, as well as specialised pelletising equipment and extraction systems. It can recycle 2 metric tonnes per day, which equates to approximately 700 million polymer banknotes per year.
“Since the plant began operations in late 2020, the volume of banknotes being recycled has grown enormously,” says Javier Andino, CCL Secure’s Head of Central Bank Technical Services in Latin America.
“The volumes forecast this year represent a seven-fold increase on 2020. That reflects the fact that 90 per cent of the central banks using GUARDIAN substrate in Latin America recycle now – and we expect this figure to increase further soon.”
Several central banks across Latin America have switched to GUARDIAN substrate in recent years – but some are yet to commence recycling. This is because GUARDIAN banknotes last three to five times longer in circulation, and therefore, depending on the volumes involved, it tends to take several years to accumulate a quantity of unfit notes that is practical to recycle.
CCL Secure is proud to have ensured a regional recycling solution will be in place when that time comes.
We are committed to collaborating with central banks to raise the rate of recycling globally – and understand that every central bank will have unique circumstance and challenges to overcome.
With dedicated technical managers in every region, CCL Secure consults closely with central banks to understand the specific challenges they face and collaborates to create effective solutions. Broadly, the best approach will be shaped by two factors.
The first is volume. While there is no minimum volume required for recycling polymer banknotes, economic viability increases with scale. This is why some central banks prefer to store shredded banknotes to be processed in batches.
The second is the availability of local recyclers. Not every central bank will have access to a suitable recycler within their own country. The solution is to shred and store banknotes, so they can be transported to a regional recycling centre once sufficient volumes have been collected.
CCL Secure’s technical managers are there to talk central banks through their options, connect them with the right recyclers, and provide information on the technical aspects of the recycling process.
The biggest challenge when recycling polymer banknotes relates to ink load. By weight, GUARDIAN polymer banknotes generally consist of 70 per cent polypropylene, with the remainder made up of inks, coatings, and any other contaminants gathered during circulation.
In the past, this led to a risk of down cycling, because the granulated polymer banknotes had to be mixed with virgin polypropylene or other recyclable materials. Now, sophisticated extruders have advanced to the point where they can handle 100 per cent granulated polymer banknotes.
New second-life products have also emerged. In particular, ‘plastic wood’ has proven to be an ideal second-life product, because its production process is not affected by ink load.
It’s a timely reminder that we need to see the forest for the trees when it comes to banknote recycling. Only polymer banknotes have a genuine recycling process in place, and in the case of GUARDIAN, the vast majority are already being turned into durable products at end-of-life.