A BURY wholesaler has become the proud first owner of a planet saving recycling machine.

WDS Group at the Peel Mills Industrial Estate have teamed up with environmental container company OnceCircle to create a recycling programme for plastic beverage kegs.

Most such kegs in the UK are no recycled and end up on landfill the firm explained.

However keen to rectify this WDS has become the home of the first of a special keg recycling machine and will now collect kegs from bars.

Then, together with OneCircle, the family run group will recycle the basic materials from kegs and turn then into new, useable KeyKegs.

Sam Evans, sales director at WDS Group, said: "We estimate that more than 500,000 KeyKegs end up in Manchester alone every year and it is great that we can now use them as raw materials again. It meets a huge need.

"Many bars and breweries have heard that we are going to process KeyKegs and have spontaneously saved them up. It is clear to them that a lot of plastic ends up in landfill and they want to prevent that from happening.

"The time has come to work together with packaging producers on closed loops, and OneCircle is leading the way."

OneCircle, which is an initiative of packaging producer Lightweight Containers, offers solutions for recycling one-way kegs around the world.

They aim to make these kegs completely circular ­— meaning all materials used in the keg are recycled to make other kegs or high end products.

Each KeyKeg consists of 81 per cent PP and PET, two types of plastics that can be reused as a circular raw material, and the rest of the materials can be used in other high-quality applications.

Every KeyKeg already consists of 30 per cent recycled material and OneCircle aim to increase to 35 per cent this year, and by another five per cent by 2020.

The KeyKegs programme first launched as a pilot scheme in London, and now the WDS Group have picked up the baton for the North.

Annemieke Hartman, from OneCircle, said: "We are very pleased to welcome WDS Group to the OneCircle community.

"WDS Group is among the leaders in sustainability and together with OneCircle they are expanding this lead. By reusing the raw materials from KeyKegs we lower the CO2 footprint of their beer to the lowest in the industry."