A new partnership between leading recycling company, First Mile and the world’s largest micro-mobility provider, Lime, will see shared electric bikes that have reached the end of their usable life being recycled, avoiding landfill, saving precious materials, and contributing to the circular economy.

By reducing our nation’s reliance on polluting motor vehicles, shared e-bike and e-scooter schemes can reap serious environmental rewards, reducing carbon emissions and improving air quality.

Sustainability has always been at the heart of Lime’s mission to provide safe and affordable alternative mobility options through its range of sharing electric bikes and scooters. The company’s sustainability credentials reflect those of First Mile, which is committed to going above and beyond in all it does to reduce its environmental impact, proudly operating its own green fleet of electric and ULEZ-compliant vehicles throughout London and Birmingham.

To date, Lime’s e-bikes have already been used more than two million times in London replacing an estimated 500,000 car vehicle trips and saving more than 200 metric tonnes of CO2 in the process. Its robust repair and reuse programme extends the life cycle of its products before they reach the end of their usable life.

At the point when an e-bike, or e-bike components, become irreparable they are collected by First Mile, and begin their recycling transformation:

1. The tyres are shredded, and the rubber recycled into horse arena and playground surfacing.

2. The bike frames are shredded, and the steel is separated and recycled back into brand new production steel.

3. The non-ferrous metals are sent to refineries where they are used to make new items, including aluminium bikes and drinks cans.

Speaking about the scheme, First Mile founder and CEO, Bruce Bratley, comments: “Despite an increasing awareness of the environmental impact of goods, so many of today’s products are still designed and manufactured without considering their end-of-life. Lime has designed its bikes with circularity in mind – easy to repair and using materials that can be effectively recycled into new valuable materials at end-of-life. Lime’s approach to sustainability is a great fit with First Mile, and we’re really pleased to be able to provide an effective recycling solution for its products.”

Florence Milner, General Manager of UK and Ireland for Lime said: “Sustainability is at the heart of everything we do at Lime. We’ve invested in extending the life cycle of our bikes through our repair and reuse programme to increase the number of zero carbon door-to-door journeys they can deliver, helping to reduce reliance on private vehicles and improve air quality for all. We’re proud to announce this partnership with First Mile, which will allow our bikes to be recycled once they’ve reached the end of their usable life, contributing to the circular economy and avoiding unnecessary landfill waste.”