We’ve had enough duvet days to last a lifetime. Burrowed under the covers like nesting birds, working from beds has become a thing, presumably making sleeping in bed less of a thing. Beds have taken a hammering, so it was no surprise to see a Sugarloaf mountain of mattresses at my local dump. Unsurprising, but still depressing.
Martin Ward started Bounce Back in 2017 as a way to create employment for members of the Traveller community. He knew there was something in the idea of recycling mattresses and it was also a way to reclaim space for Travellers – until plastic buckets arrived, tinsmiths made a living from repairs, Ward explained when I rang him.
Reusing and repairing isn’t just environmentally friendly, it creates more jobs than disposal. He was shocked at the level of unemployment among Travellers at more than 80 per cent. The other surprise was the number of mattresses dumped every year, a gargantuan 600,000 of them, each one potentially taking up 23cubic ft in landfill or €180 worth of space.
Bounce Back Recycling was set up as a social enterprise employing three people. Now they have a workforce of 12 and have recycled 50,000 mattresses, all dismantled by hand to salvage materials.
The steel is recycled, some foams can be used to make carpet underlay and timber is chopped for kindling. Bounce Back can collect from homes in 10 counties as well as businesses and local authorities across the rest of the country.
Circular economy
Future plans include developing products from old mattresses; house insulation would be perfect given the thermal properties of the materials but regulation change is needed to allow repurposed materials be used for insulation.
A proper circular economy would ensure manufacturers make mattresses from natural materials that can be recycled into new products. The nasties are the stuff of nightmares. Polyurethane is a common mattress component, emitting gas as you sleep and taking decades to break down in landfill.
In the meantime, to avoid adding to the mattress mountain, you can rotate and flip your mattress to make it last longer, clean it with a sprinkling of baking soda, which is then vacuumed off, and get a mattress topper.
Sheep farmers Roger and Lesley Payne started making sheepswool duvets 12 years ago in Wales (calling them baavets instead of duvets). After meeting Roger at the National Ploughing Championship, Meath-based couple Breda and Tom Gibney set up the Irish arm of Baavet sending Irish sheepswool to the UK to be made into duvets, pillows and mattress toppers.
The Paynes are experimenting with a sheepswool mattress now too, according to their website. That’s a glimpse of a future natural mattress industry, with the mattresses being repurposed for house insulation at the end of their days. Sleeping the dream.
