Residents slash landfill burden with ‘stunning’ recycling rates

Latest figures show massive increases in recycling rates from kerbside collections, securing significant savings in the amount of penalties charged to the local authority for taking waste to a tip.

In a five-week period leading up to the end of January, a total of 53 per cent of household waste was recycled - an 11 per cent increase on the same period last year.

The biggest increase was in the amount of food waste, garden waste and cardboard collected in brown bins - a total of 2,248 tonnes representing a 260 per cent increase.

A total of 2,365 tonnes of paper, card, drinks cans, plastics and glass were collected in the blue bins, in increase of 67 per cent on the same period last year.

That meant the amount of residual waste destined for landfill after being collected in the green bins fell by 26 per cent to 6,800 tonnes.

Symon Fraser, East Riding Council portfolio holder for environment, housing and planning, said: “These are stunning results. The folk of East Riding pulled out all the stops over Christmas and in January to keep out of landfill as much of their waste as they could.

“The increase in what was put in the brown bins shows our residents heeded the calls to put the turkey carcases and cardboard packaging in the brown bins. Their enthusiasm will help us to provide the compost giveaways in a few months’ time.”

As well as reducing its impact on the environment, the increase in recycling will boost council budgets and save millions of pounds in the spiralling costs of sending excess waste to landfill.

Last year, the council sent 90,000 tonnes of unrecycled waste to landfill, for which it paid a landfill tax of £56 per tonne, or more than £5m. In two years the charge is set to rise to £80 per tonne, which would incur a penalty of £7.2m based on those figures.

Residents in Holderness helped make the most significant inroads into the waste mountain.

The reduction in the amount of waste collected in the green bins was 36 per cent over the five-week period, followed by a 28 per cent drop in Market Weighton and Pocklington, 27 per cent reductions in both Beverley and Haltemprice, 22 per cent falls in Bridlington and Driffield, and a 17 per cent reduction in Goole.

The figures come as residents across East Yorkshire are being urged to commit to new long-term recycling rates.

Hull and East Riding councils have launched a review of their Joint Sustainable Waste Management Strategy, which will guide the management of household waste for the next eight years.

As part of the review, the councils are proposing eight aims along with targets and actions for achieving them.

The targets include:

* Recycling and composting between 60 and 65 per cent of household waste by 2020;

* Reducing the amount of biodegradable waste sent to landfill to 20 per cent of the 1995 level of 97,376 tonnes by 2015/16, and to 15 per cent by 2020/21;

* Encouraging residents and businesses to become responsible for the waste they create.

The recycling and composting target would be 65 per cent in the East Riding and 60 per cent in Hull, because there are bigger gardens in the East Riding and more flats and apartments in Hull.

Announcing the review, East Riding Council leader Stephen Parnaby said: “We must now look ahead knowing that we face some challenges, the pressures on our budgets being just one. But there is much to be encouraged about and in the handbook we list the ways in which we will provide value-for-money services and facilities to manage waste through to 2020.”

To see the handbook outlining the proposals and comment on the review, visit www.target45plus.org.uk.