Green waste collections are seen as important because of the weight they bring to collection tonnage totals, so in turn increasing recycling rates.
” Our recycling scheme actually improved but because of the drop in green waste this has not been noticed “
– Sue Reed, recycling manager at Daventry
Lichfield, which is now the top council for in the recycling league table, has said that its composting scheme, which sees green waste collected on a fortnightly basis, helped it achieve a recycling rate of 46%. It said that the additional waste picked up by the composting scheme complements the collection that the council already runs.
Residual waste and compost are collected on alternate weeks in Lichfield, while the recyclable materials are collected weekly, encouraging the residents to put as much as possible in the recycling bin.
But Councillor Alan White, portfolio holder for operational services at Lichfield council admitted that the recycling scheme it uses would not be able to work across the entire country.
He said: “I don't believe that this is a scheme that could be applied nationwide, it wouldn't work in areas that have lots of high rise properties, the collections would just not be possible. We are a well dispersed low level area which makes it easier to collect from everywhere.”
Slipping
Meanwhile Daventry, the council replaced by Lichfield in the table has put its fall of two percentage points down to a poor year for green waste.
Sue Reed, recycling manager at Daventry, said that the recycling rate was hit this year by the dry summer. “We collected around 2,000 tonnes less green waste than the previous year and we rely on garden waste to keep our rate high. Our recycling scheme actually improved but because of the drop in green waste this has not been noticed,” she said.
Leading the way on the south coast is Dorset county council which achieved a recycling rate of 29%. Recycling officer Gary Simpson put this down to the councils long history of recycling. “The reason that we have such a good recycling rate is that we have been recycling for such a long time, it isn't something that you can achieve over night,” he said.
” Once every household is on our new scheme we believe it is possible to achieve a recycling rate of 50% in Kettering “
– Christopher Lamb, environment portfolio holder at Kettering
And the top unitary council was the Isle of Wight, which is one of only a few councils to offer a weekly collection of kitchen waste for recycling. Lyn Clark, community liaison officer at Island Waste Services, the company that collects the islands waste, said that many councils were put off collecting kitchen waste because of the laws surrounding animal by-products. She said that on the Island they had the facilities to deal with this.
Major improvements
Two of the top improvers were Fylde and Breckland councils which achieved an increase of 19 and 18 percentage points respectively.
Breckland puts its recycling rate of 28% down to the way that it went about putting the scheme together. Sarah Cam, recycling manager at Breckland, said: “Before the scheme started we sent out consultations offering the residents five different schemes so it was them that decided on the system we would use.
Low rates
At the other end of the table Liverpool and Kettering, which both achieved single figure recycling rates are turning to green waste as one of the solutions to low recycling rates.
Liverpool city council has found itself at the bottom of the table for the second consecutive year with a recycling rate of just 4%. But the council believes that this will not continue when the 2005 figures are released.
Alan Smith, waste strategy officer, said: “Our first kerbside recycling scheme was only started in July 2003 so our residents haven't had a chance to get used to things yet and we have not had a full year of multi-material recycling having only started in October. Once everything is up and running we are going to hit our target of 15% by this time next year.”
Mr Smith said that the area has had trouble recycling due to areas of large deprivation. He said in some residents were requesting to collect their recyclables in sacks rather than boxes because they simply did not have the room to contain the box.
Kettering
Recycling rates in single figures are “no longer acceptable” according to the government, Kettering is one of the councils that currently falls into this category but it believes that within the next few years it could find itself at the other end of the table.
With the help of a Defra grant Kettering introduced a new scheme to a third of its residents in October, which included a grey bin for the collection of green waste and cardboard. The council also uses red and blue boxes for the collection of newspaper, glass, cans and plastic.
Kettering has achieved a recycling rate of 50% in the first area to receive the scheme and the council expects this rate to continue to rise once the rest of the borough takes up the scheme.
Christopher Lamb, environment portfolio holder at Kettering, said: “The second phase of the scheme is rolled out in April this year with the final stage in April 2006. Once every household is on the scheme we believe it is possible to achieve a recycling rate of 50% across the borough. We should at least be in the top quarter of English councils.”
But for Kettering it is not just the kerbside collection that needs to be dealt with. In a poll on the Kettering council website asking how easy residents found it to recycle, over 50% of the counties residents that replied said that they struggled with the household waste recycling centre.
Mr Lamb said: “Our household waste recycling centre is run by the county but it has assured us we will be getting a new one soon. It is not user friendly and is far too small for the area. A new site should be set up in the next few years that will hopefully increase our rate further.”
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