Household waste recycling levels soar in Norwich

The Norfolk local authority claims that recycling has increased by almost double from 18.4% in April 2007 to nearly 36.5% in June 2008 and reduced waste to landfill by 20% over the same period.

Councillor Brian Morrey, executive member for sustainable city development and leader of the council's waste working party, said: “I would like to say a big well done and thank you to everyone in the city who is recycling – every little really does help.

“Our new services are making recycling easier for people. The introduction of the blue bins and the garden waste scheme have meant that people can recycle more from home, and I hope that people continue to take advantage of these as much as possible,” he added.

AWC

Norwich city council intends to roll out alternate weekly collections to the north and the east of the city in November, having introduced the scheme to the south and the west in October 2007 (see letsrecycle.com story).

Working with contractors CityCare, which is owned by Veolia Environmental Services, the council plans to extend the scheme to include a further 14,000 homes in November this year, as focus turns to the council's efforts to become one of the best performing councils for recycling by 2012.

Improvements

In addition, alternate weekly collections have allowed the council to extend the materials that can be collected at the kerbside in blue wheeled bins. Residents in areas currently under the alternate weekly collection scheme can recycle plastic bottles and metal aerosols, as well as paper and card, tins, cans and glass.

Cllr Adrian Ramsey, leader of the Green Party city councillors and a member of the council's waste working party, said: “It's fantastic news that the recycling rate has increased so much, and it shows our potential after further improvements to the recycling service are made.”

Further attempts to increase recycling can be seen in the provision of brown bins for green waste, introduced in April 2008. The brown bin scheme allows residents to recycle green waste, with the council so far collecting 700 tonnes of garden waste for composting.

Other initiatives discussed by the council includes the introduction of communal bins for recycling and waste for flats in the city, as part of a bid to give even more residents the opportunity to recycle at home.