Belfast opts for weighing of recycling bins

Belfast began its kerbside paper collection in June, covering 18,000 households. Over the next two years, the city council plans to expand the collection to include over 65,000 residences.

Martin Doherty, of the waste management department at Belfast city council, explained that it is becoming increasingly more cost effective to collect materials for recycling instead of landfill. He said: “The council currently pays around 40 per tonne for waste consigned to landfill and this is set to increase dramatically in the future. But we can receive about 28 for every tonne of paper we recycle and paper represents between 10 and 11% of all household refuse.”

The council has chosen to use 140 litre wheelie bins from Sulo which have been fitted with microprocessor tags. The specialised collection vehicle has been equipped with a comb-lift device from Terberg which has been adapted to use an antenna to read the chips and an automatic digital &#39ca;tch weigher' to weigh the bins. The council hopes to expand its fleet of specialised collection vehicles to four to cover the expansion of the kerbside scheme.

Data

The dedicated equipment will let the collection team gather data on a RAM card in the truck cab. The data is downloaded onto the council's computer network at the end of each round.

The information recorded will be specific to each household participating in the paper collection. The system will not only record the accurate weight of paper put out by individual households but can also be used by the collection crews to report faulty or damaged bins. It will allow the council to target its information and promotion campaigns to specific areas and households.

Mr Doherty said: “It is essential that we can track the progress and effectiveness of the initial phase of the recycling initiative. Knowing how much paper is being recycled and to what extent each individual household, in each area of the city, is participating is vital for developing future recycling strategies.”

He added: “The Sulo weigh and ID system provides exactly the sort of information we need. It also has the major benefit of being thoroughly tried and tested in applications throughout mainland Europe: it's accurate, rugged and user friendly.”