Cleanaway Western Sydney MRF

Highlights

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  Transforming NSW’s commingled recycling

  Boosting capacity to recover valuable materials for reuse.

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  Cutting-edge technology

  State-of-the-art equipment optimising quality of recovered materials.

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  Recycling to Australia’s highest standards

  Exceeding recycling requirements of Council of Australian Governments (COAG).

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  Maximising resource recovery

  Processing up to 120,000 tonnes of recycling per year.

About Cleanaway Western Sydney MRF

Cleanaway Western Sydney Material Recovery Facility (MRF) in Rooty Hill is transforming Sydney’s commercial and household commingled recycling. One of Australia’s most advanced recycling plants, this best-in-class facility extracts valuable resources from recycling, giving them new life in the circular economy.

Delivered in partnership with Blacktown City Council, the facility expands Cleanaway’s network of infrastructure assets delivering  sustainable recycling services for our customers.

What we process

The MRF handles a wide range of recyclable materials collected from kerbside and commercial recycling bins, including:

Using sophisticated optical sorting, magnetic separation and mechanical screening, the facility achieves up to 99.5% purity in recovered recycled materials. They can then be reused in high-value manufacturing and converted into new products and items, including food-grade applications like plastic containers and packaging.

How it works

The facility is built for performance, reliability and precision.

1. PRE-SORT: MRF staff manually remove contamination (e.g. plastic bags).
2. DISC SCREEN SORTING: Disc screens are configured to separate material by size, with larger material travelling over the top and smaller items falling through to a separate conveyor
3. PAPER & CARDBOARD SORTING: Infrared sensors and air jets sort fibres helping achieve high purity rates.
4. BALLISTIC SEPARATOR: Shaking the materials causes 3D objects (plastics) to fall back and 2D objects (paper/cardboard) to travel upwards. Small glass falls through the screen onto the glass line.
5. GLASS: Sent for further sorting by colour.
6. MAGNETS: Rotating magnets pick up steel cans.
7. EDDY CURRENTS: An electromagnet field repels aluminium cans off the conveyor belt.
8. OPTICAL SORTING: Infrared sensors and air jets sort plastic types 1 and 2 (PET and HDPE respectively).
9. MANUAL SORTING: MRF staff manually sort the other plastic types (3 to 7)

Benefits for councils and businesses

• Increases recycling capacity for NSW’s growing population and advances circularity.
• Achieves some of Australia’s highest material recovery and purity rates, so more recycling is recovered and reused.
• Provides cost-effective waste-management services for NSW’s metropolitan and regional areas.
• Offers a fully integrated solution to NSW customers in conjunction with our other services.
• Supports local communities and the economy, prioritising local employment where possible.

Beyond the building