Plans to add mixed plastics to recycling collections in Cambridgeshire have been put on ice due to concerns about the value of the material.
Cambridge city, Fenland and Huntingdonshire district councils, which have a joint MRF contract with waste and recycling firm Viridor, had been due to add rigid mixed plastics including pots, tubs and trays to their kerbside collections from July 31, following demand from residents.
However, negotiations over the pricing of the material between the three authorities and Viridor have stalled, and the future of the scheme is now unclear.
A spokeswoman for Fenland council told letsrecycle.com this morning (August 15): There are a few details that need to be ironed out in the contract and negotiations are going to be happening today. It is to do with pricing and we are waiting confirmation that this is going ahead.
Under the terms of the councils recycling contract, which has been running since 2009 (see letsrecycle.com story), the authorities collect the recyclables and are paid a fee for each tonne of material sent for recycling based on its current value.
According to Fenland council, this arrangement earns it around 33,462 per year and offers savings of around 200,000 per year compared to its previous processing arrangement.
In a report on the proposals to add mixed plastics to recycling collections published in April, the council estimated the service would see an extra 400 tonnes of material collected per year across the borough, boosting income by around 15,500 and is likely to see its recycling rate rise by between 1-2%.
Value
However, the report highlighted concerns that should the value of the material fall, the mixed plastics collections could become a cost to the councils, and Fenland estimates that a 5% fall in the value of the material based on current prices would see it bear a cost of 12,667.
Cambridge city council has also raised concerns over the value of adding mixed plastics to recycling collections, estimating that the material would reduce the value of recyclables collected by the authorities by 5 per tonne, and if the value of recycled material continued to fall, its income from recycling could fall by 32,190.
In a report to the councils environment and waste services executive in March, the councils waste strategy manager, Jen Robertson, said: It is important to note that the reduction in value of the mix of recyclables may happen anyway based on economic decline in markets, but the inclusion of this material may bring the move to the low bracket more quickly than without the material.
Negotiations between the three councils and Viridor are due to take place today, and it is not yet known when the authorities are likely to begin collecting the material which would be sorted at Viridors materials recycling facility (MRF) at Crayford in Kent.
Subscribe for free