Its The Weight Of The Waste That Matters

Its The Weight Of The Waste That Matters

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Recycling of aluminium and plastics continues to suffer relative to recycling of heavier materials such as paper, glass, steel and food/yard waste. Local Councils' compliance with recycling targets is based on the percentage of overall household waste that is recycled, by weight, thus 'tipping the scales' towards recycling of heavier materials.

Councils are incentivised to support recycling. One incentive is to reduce the tax per tonne on waste disposed of in landfills by increasing recycling. The second is that the amount of allowances for disposing of waste diverted from landfill. Both incentives are again weight based and therefore favour the heavier materials. Compliance is expressed in percentage of the amount of tonnage of household waste diverted from landfill. Because plastics and aluminiums are lighter, a larger tonnage is needed to have the same amount of target compliance weight of a heavier material. The effect is that councils are less interested in collecting and recycling lighter recyclable material. As local revenues decrease, there will also be increasing pressure to use the most financially efficient ways to meet compliance goals for waste management.

The use of tonnage as a measure of household waste diverted from landfills seems to be in conflict with packaging reduction targets, i.e. smaller packaging and / or lighter, no packaging. Lighter packaging is generally provided by aluminium and plastics versus glass and steel,but is still penalised by being light in terms of compliance weight / percentage ratios are measured. If the measure of compliance was modified so that collection of aluminium and plastics was not perceived to be a negative factor in compliance with diversion targets, then Councils would be encouraged to provide facilities for the recycling of these waste products. As added benefits, aluminium has a high value in the reuse market, and also has a large impact on reducing the carbon footprint of its original use. Production of aluminium cans from recycled aluminium uses about 5% of the energy used to produce cans from bauxite ore. Even the manufacture of wheelie bins has to comply with recylcled production targets

Some options for increasing the viability of collection of aluminium and plastics might be:

1. Monitor Council waste reduction compliance targets by material, rather than as a overall percentage of the total household waste stream. For example, Defra has published packaging recycling targets for 2011 and 2012, by material type. Perhaps this could be done initially through the use of voluntary pilot projects for Councils.

2. Provide consistency in plastics collection, which can be very confusing to the layperson. PET and HDPE comprise the vast majority of household waste plastics. Concentrate on getting the greater majority of local councils provideing facilities for these two lighter materials. Provide expanded consumer education and clear identification as to acceptable materials for recycling.

3. Increase opportunities for co-mingled collection. Co-mingled collection is more efficient for households and the collection system, but transfers the headaches to the processing end of the operation, often through the use of MRFs (Material Recovery Facilities).

4. Provide incentives to UK industries providing new and sustainable ways to reuse recycled materials.

Some simple steps can be implemented to prevent this weight target cherry picking. Waste management and recycling should be for our long term future benefit, not short term targets. Playing your small part in household recycling can, will and does help

About the Author:
The sleek and modern 5L and 7L kitchen caddies have been designed to fit seamlessly into a modern kitchen and are available in a range of modern colours with a high gloss finish. The accompanying 23L kitchen caddy is the perfect companion to the smaller indoor caddies and is ideal solution for the kerbside collection of food waste



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