The city authority, which is currently preparing to let a long-term waste contract as part of the Glasgow and Clyde Valley area waste group, is to invite tenders at the end of this year for a variety of pre-treatment waste technologies.
” Autoclaving will deliver and achieve our recycling targets “
– Ian Galbraith, head of waste strategy at Glasgow city council
However, speaking to letsrecycle.com yesterday (Tues), a council officer commented that autoclaving was the “only” technology which could meet its needs regarding planning consent, costs and recycling rates.
In particular, Glasgow council's head of waste strategy, Ian Galbraith, claims the technology would capture significantly more recyclate from flats – which make up 70% of the city – than its existing recycling scheme.
He said: “Our tenemental recycling service is proving too expensive at 180 a tonne. It was originally a trial and we are now rolling it out city wide but participation is pretty poor and in the trial it only increased recycling by 2%.”
“Meanwhile autoclaving has a 25% capture rate for recycling and diverts 95% of material from landfill- which is much better,” he remarked.
Targets
Mr Galbraith explained that while Glasgow's recycling service for houses was successful, the service for flats had proved problematic due to the difficulty experienced by residents in accessing bin storage areas, a lack or participation and a high student population.
However, he explained that during autoclaving waste would be treated with steam at high temperatures which sterilise the waste and make it easier to remove metals and plastics for recycling and an organic fraction, which can then be used in gasification or anaerobic digestion.
The process would also help Glasgow to boost its 16.5% recycling rate in order to meet targets of 40% by 2010 set by the Scottish Executive and to avoid increasing financial penalties from landfill tax and the Landfill Allowance Trading Scheme (LATS).
The interest in autoclaving comes just two weeks after plans were unveiled for an enormous autoclave facility in Gateshead (see letsrecycle.com story).
Mr Galbraith said: “Autoclaving will deliver and achieve our recycling targets and it is the only technology we have seen which can achieve that. We can't deliver incineration in Glasgow as we had them up until the late 70s and public perception is bad and mechanical biological treatment does not have the same recycling rate and there are some health and safety issues coming to the fore.”
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Glasgow's recommendations will feed into an outline business case for the contract being prepared by the Glasgow and Clyde Valley Area Waste Group – which is made up of East and West Dunbartonshire, Inverclyde, East Renfrewshire, Renfrewshire and Argyll & Bute councils.
A contract for 20-25 years is due to go out to tender at the end of this year.
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