News in Brief

WRAP has launched a three-year programme to improve the opportunities for recycling gypsum waste, which is found mainly in scrap plasterboard.

Gypsum waste is found in scrap plasterboard

The programme is funded through the BREW initiative – Business Resource Efficiency and Waste – which aims to cut waste management bills in the business sector by waste reduction and recycling measures.

In the next few weeks a tender competition will open for research and development projects, operational trials and demonstration projects. These will look at new applications for gypsum waste, test practical and market viability of existing and new processes and will demonstrate key benefits “in a real life situation”.

WRAP is also seeking to establish an industry forum to take the work forward. WRAP's director of materials, Liz Goodwin, explained: “Consultation will be essential to the delivery of sustainable recycling solutions for gypsum waste in the future.”

Local authorities are teaming up with the community recycling sector in an attempt to move waste re-use up the waste and policy agenda

The Local Authority Recycling Advisory Committee has teamed up with the Furniture Recycling Network and consultancy Network Recycling to develop opportunities for community groups in bulky household waste services.

Backed by Defra’s Waste Partnership Fund, the work will include publication of Best Practice guidance for community re-use organizations, ongoing assistance for groups negotiating partnerships and research into the costs and benefits of contracting out bulky waste services.

FRN's Caroline Lee-Smith, who is managing the project, said: “The community re-use sector can offer local authorities great benefits, including delivering a high standard of bulky waste service, assisting local people into employment and providing people on low incomes with basic household items.

“We aim to set out the national standards and specific codes of practice that our members will work to, offering reliable and auditable ways of re-using and recycling items and facilitating partnerships,” Ms Lee-Smith added.

Waste Awareness Wales has launched a new guide to help organisers of public events to implement recycling schemes.

Cllr Richard Parry Hughes, Gwenan Davies and Georgina Taubman of Waste Awareness Wales at the launch of the Events Recycling Guide.

The guide was launched yesterday at the National Eisteddfod, and aims to tackle the “huge amounts of waste” generated at public events including sports fixtures, music festivals or street parades.

This year's Eisteddfod organisers – working with Gwynedd Council – have implemented many of the recommendations in the guide. Visitors will be able to recycle plastic bottles, paper, cans and glass waste, and for the first time food waste.

Cllr Richard Parry Hughes, who chairs Waste Awareness Wales, said: “In the same way that the Eisteddfod has led the way in event waste management, we hope that the recommendations of the guide are taken on board by all event organisers across Wales.”

A free copy of the Events Recycling Guide is available by calling 0845 330 5540, or online at the Waste Awareness Wales site.

A team of 120 “compost doctors” and 90 teachers is to descend on households in Pembrokeshire and Blaenau Gwent to show them how to use their home composting bins.

The Welsh Assembly government is providing 50,000 for the three-year “County-wide Home Composting Project”, which is helping fund 52,000 new compost bins for householders.

Carwyn Jones, minister for environment, planning and countryside at the Welsh Assembly, said: “We must keep developing ways to support people who want to compost at home. That includes providing facilities and support, which will be given by specially-trained &#39c;ompost doctors' working on this project.”

Funding for the project has also from partner local authorities and the Strategic Recycling Scheme.