Tesco is to spend £8.9m on 100 giant state-of-the-art speaking recycling centres that can reward customers for recycling waste.

The units talk customers through the process of recycling plastics, metals, glass and other materials, while providing visual cues on colour touch screens.

They can also be programmed to offer consu­mers incentives such as Clubcard points, entries into an instant lottery, product coupons and charity donations.

A Tesco spokeswoman said the retailer had not yet decided if rewards would be dispensed by the machines.

She added: "We haven't decided yet exactly where the machines will be ­located, but many will be placed in areas with low recycling rates. Trial machines significantly improved recycling behaviour. Recycling rates ­doubled in test locations within two months of installation."

The units are supplied by Norwegian recycling ­technology company Tomra. President and CEO Amund Skarholt said that Tomra would not sell the tech­nology to other UK supermarkets for a couple of years, although there was no formal exclusivity agreement.

He added: "This has been a joint development effort and Tesco has ­invested a lot of resources. For the moment we will focus our UK activities on making them successful with this project."

The roll-out follows six successful pilots run by Tesco using the machines since 2004 in the south-east, with the support of the Waste & Resources Action Plan. On average, customers have been returning 100,000 objects per month to each pilot centre.

Tesco and Tomra will begin installing the machines at Tesco supermarkets and Extra stores later this year. They expect to complete the roll-out by the end of 2007.

The initiative is designed to contribute to Tesco's objective of doubling customer recycling by 2008.

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