Formed in 2005, Restructa Ltd are licensed by SEPA (The Scottish Environment Protection Agency) to recycle televisions and IT equipment. These are then stripped down at the company’s North Newmoor site to recover copper, printed circuit boards, metals and plastics. The glass tube is then split on specialised equipment and the hazardous phosphor materials removed to make it safe.

North Ayrshire Council has worked closely with the company firstly to identify new premises, then assisting in training, and finally working with the management to help realize the company’s growth potential. Today Restructa employs over 40 staff, the majority of whom are from Irvine and the surrounding area and many came to the company as long term unemployed via the government’s New Deal project.

Last month the company opened a new plant in Kyle Road, Ailsa Business Park, Irvine which will treat the glass recovered from cathode ray tubes (CRT’s) removed from old televisions and computer monitors to allow it to be exported for re-use in the manufacture of new CRT’s. Commenting on the new facility, Environment Minister Mike Russell MSP said that Restructa were “at the cutting edge of the recycling industry in Scotland.”

The minister added: “What Restructa is doing is to help us adapt to a one planet lifestyle and that means taking the things we have and making sure they are reused. I’ve visited recycling centres throughout Scotland, and I’ve seen people bringing along their unwanted televisions and computer screens. These people want to know that something is going to happen to them, that they are going to go back into the chain of use. That’s precisely what Restructa is doing and doing very well.”

Restructa’s environmental director Lyndsay Stewart added, “People like to buy the latest technology and when flat screen models came in, thousands of old TV sets were being thrown out and eventually ended up in landfill sites. That’s where we come in. We can take each set apart and the plastic, metal, glass, everything, and set them aside for recycling. We reckon 97% of a television is fully recycled and we can manage up to one million TV's and monitors per year!”

To find out more about the company, visit www.restructa.co.uk.

Pictured at the opening of the new facility with Environment Minister Mike Russell are Restructa’s directors Bruce McLean, Bill Paterson and Lyndsay Stewart.