ECT already provides a recycling service to most of the borough and the new contract will see changes including the provision of more recycling facilities to residents in blocks of flats and maisonettes.
The service will build on the success of the current recycling operation by ECT in Hounslow, which has helped the council achieve Beacon status for its waste and recycling services and helped the borough increase its recycling rate from 4% to 19% over the last five years.
Under the new contract which was agreed by Hounslow’s Committee of the Council on 9 October 2001, the service will be extended to cover all households in the borough with the introduction of a new estate based service for those living in medium to high-rise flats.
Coming during the same period as the launch of the Greater London Authority’s new municipal waste management strategy, the council says the contract will help ensure Hounslow meet its statutory target of 28% of household waste to be recycled or composted by 2003/04.
On average, each household in Hounslow currently produces over one tonne of waste a year. Under the improved service residents living in houses and maisonettes can put their jars and glass bottles, cans, paper, aluminium foil, textiles, Yellow Pages and shoes into a green recycling box, which is collected by ECT Recycling from the kerbside each week. Residents living in medium-to-high rise flats will be able to take advantage of a new estates based service under which every 50-60 flats will have access to their own local set of recycling banks for glass, food and drink cans, as well as paper. The estates-based service is due to be rolled out in the early part of 2002.
ECT Recycling is the largest not-for-profit, community owned, recycling organisation in the UK. This new contract means that ECT Recycling will now be providing a doorstep recycling service to more than one in six Londoners.
Andy Bond, Managing Director of ECT Recycling, said: “Comprehensive recycling schemes like those provided by ECT in partnership with boroughs like Hounslow, make people think twice about the way we deal with rubbish and will ultimately help to meet government recycling targets as well as resulting in a better environment for the capital’s residents. We are delighted to be renewing our partnership with Hounslow Council and to be working with them to extend the service.”
Innovative schemes
Cllr Valerie Lamey, deputy leader of Hounslow and executive member responsible for waste management, said: ” Hounslow Council has been at the forefront of recycling and over the years has introduced a range of innovative schemes that other authorities have followed. London is quite simply running out of landfill sites so making recycling an attractive and easy option for residents makes good sense financially and for the environment.”
From the mid 1990s ECT has won an increasing number of contracts from local councils including: Ealing, Brent, Lambeth, Vale of White Horse, Waltham Forest Council, West Oxfordshire and Barnet. It is the largest not-for-profit, community owned, recycling organisation in the UK, marketing over 50,000 tonnes of recycled material per year and has supply contracts with Aylesford Newsprint, British Glass Recycling, AMG and Holmen Paper.
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