The sustainability position
Including the four claims we refuse to make.
The Reclaim Engine
Show your
working
Most container yards put a leaf on the page and a percentage in the headline. This page gives you the arithmetic instead — the factors, the assumptions, the numbers we could not divert, and a calculator you can point at your own order.
Order desk
Turn a number into an order
Once the calculator says something you like, this form turns it into a written quote. Quantity and delivery ZIP are all we really need.
01Calculator
What does your order avoid?
Set the count and the route. Everything updates against the counterfactual of buying the same number of containers new.
26 is a full single-stacked trailer. 520 is a year of steady buying for a mid-size blender.
2,470kgCO₂e avoided≈ 6,175 car miles
3,380lbKept out of landfill1,716 lb of that is steel
11,336galProcess water avoidedVirgin resin and steel production
113yrMature-tree yearsSequestration equivalent
Measured against the counterfactual of buying 26 new containers. Factors are published in the table below and we use the conservative end of every range.
The one-paragraph version
Manufacturing a new 275 gallon IBC embodies roughly 108 kg CO₂e — about 60 kg in the galvanised steel cage, 34 kg in the HDPE bottle and the balance in the pallet, fittings and assembly. Reconditioning an existing container embodies about 13 kg. Rebottling one sits at about 49 kg. That means a reconditioned container carries roughly an eighth of the climate cost of a new one, and reuse beats recycle-then-remake by about six to one.
02Factors
Every number this site uses
Published in one place so that a customer, an auditor or a competitor can check our arithmetic rather than take a marketing claim on trust. If you think one of these is wrong, tell us — that conversation improves the numbers.
| Component | Mass (lb) | Mass (kg) | Material |
|---|---|---|---|
| HDPE bottle | 39 | 17.7 | Blow-moulded high-density polyethylene |
| Steel cage | 66 | 29.9 | Galvanised tubular steel, welded |
| Composite pallet | 22 | 10.0 | HDPE / wood composite |
| Valve and fittings | 3 | 1.4 | Polypropylene, brass, EPDM |
| Total tare | 130 | 59.0 | — |
| Route | kg CO₂e | Process water (gal) | vs. new |
|---|---|---|---|
| New, virgin components | 108 | 460 | 100% |
| Recycled, then bought new | 78 | — | 72% |
| Rebottled | 49 | 190 | 45% |
| Reconditioned | 13 | 24 | 12% |
| Equivalence | Factor | Basis |
|---|---|---|
| Passenger car | 0.4 kg CO₂e per mile | US fleet average |
| Mature tree | 21.8 kg CO₂e per year | Sequestration, temperate |
| US household | 21.5 kg CO₂e per day | All energy uses |
| End-of-life recovery | 96% by mass | Measured on our own line |
Assumptions we have deliberately made conservative: we do not count avoided landfill methane, we do not count avoided transport of virgin material, and we count only the cage and pallet as diverted on a rebottle even though the old bottle is recycled. All three choices reduce the headline benefit.
03Verified · Q2 2026
What we actually diverted
Calculator output is an estimate. These are unit counts from the grading station and tonnage from scale-certified weigh tickets.
41,820Containers recovered
2,431 tDiverted from landfill
3,287 tCO₂e avoided vs. virgin purchase
101 tLandfilled, published deliberately
Sellers and asset-recovery customers receive a signed diversion statement covering their own containers, with weigh tickets attached and downstream destinations named on request. How programme reporting works →
?Questions
About the numbers
Where do these emission factors come from?
Conservative industry averages for North American virgin HDPE and primary galvanised steel production, combined with our own measured energy and water consumption per container across the wash line. Where a published range exists we have used the end that understates the benefit of reuse, so the figures are floor estimates rather than ceilings.
Can I use these numbers in a sustainability report?
Yes, with the factor table attached and cited as supplier-published. For anything that has to survive an audit we issue a diversion certificate backed by scale-certified weigh tickets — a calculator output is an estimate, and a weigh ticket is evidence. Ask for the certificate.
Why does the calculator not offer 'new' as an option?
Because new is the baseline everything is measured against, so choosing it would return zero. The question the tool answers is 'what do I avoid by not buying new', and that only has an answer if you are buying something else.
The landfill figure for rebottling is lower. Why?
Because a rebottle keeps the cage and pallet in service but the old bottle is granulated rather than reused. We count the cage and pallet mass as diverted and we do not count the bottle, even though it is recycled rather than landfilled. Counting recycled material as diverted-from-landfill is a common way of inflating these numbers and we have chosen not to do it.
◆On the yard
»Keep reading
Eighteen years, eight owners
The carbon arithmetic across a full lifetime.
Build a spec
The configurator shows impact live as you change it.