A pioneer of kerbside food waste collections, the North London borough received money from WRAP in 2010 for its work on food waste.
However, Islington claims it faces “massive” funding cuts from central government and will finalise its budget for next year at a council meeting on 24 February, with the borough-wide replacement of kerbside collections with communal food waste containers included in the proposed document.
The move follows a trial for 2,000 properties last summer in the London borough’s Tollington ward, where weekly kerbside food waste collections were replaced by ‘smart’ communal BigBelly food waste containers “within reasonable walking distance” of homes (see letsrecycle.com story).
Residents were encouraged to compost their food waste at home or take it to one of 13 locations, while garden waste has been collected from six communal collection points in parks or collected from households for a fee.
Successful pilot
This three-month pilot was subsequently described as “successful” in a report by Islington’s recycling officer Matthew Homer, who also suggested that contamination of recycling and communal bins had been “manageable”.
Furthermore, he said that the recycling rate “had not been significantly affected and similar tonnages of recycling material had been collected”.
Weighbridge data was compared by the council showing there was “not a significant increase or decrease [in tonnage collected] on the pilot round compared with the other five areas” of the borough.
The ‘smart’ communal bins were fitted with sensors that notified officers when they were full, and Mr Homer said there had been no complaints since the start of the trial about the bins causing hygiene problems.
He also said that as the trial progressed, the council received fewer concerns from residents about the impact of the service change on the borough’s recycling rate.
Savings
Door-to-door take up of kerbside food waste collections in the borough is only at around 25-30%, according to a council report, and scrapping this service across Islington would reduce the number of collection crews and vehicles as well as enable the collection of dry recycling and refuse in the same vehicles.
Currently, the council’s split-body collection vehicles collect 60% residual waste and 40% dry recycling from households every week, but the council has said it could reverse these compartments in future “if the proportion of recycling increased to levels greater than that of the residual waste”.
The changes could produce savings of up to £1 million a year, with Islington facing central government funding cuts of around £70 million over the next four years, on top of around £150 million it has already saved from its budget since 2010.
Implementation
Ahead of the budget meeting later this month, the council is set to undertake a final review of resource requirements for door-to-door collections and servicing communal food and garden waste sites, but a decision has yet to be made regarding implementation and timescale of the roll-out.
A council report also explains that “equalities implications would be reviewed and consideration would be given to container design, route optimisation, communication and implementation”.
Food and garden waste are currently treated at LondonWaste’s Edmonton EcoPark. The council’s weekly refuse and dry recycling service will remain unchanged.
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