News in Brief

Chesterfield is starting up its fortnightly green waste and cardboard collections once again, after the winter break.

Last year, the borough recycled about 19.3% of the 44,340 tonnes of household waste produced, but the council believes 60% of household waste can ultimately be recycled.

Cllr Keith Morgan, lead member for environmental services, said: “Thanks to our residents' support, Chesterfield is doing really well at recycling and composting its rubbish, well above the national average. But there is still a long way to go.”

Meanwhile, schools in Chesterfield at competing in a challenge run by the Yellow Pages and the Woodland Trust to get families and friends to bring in their Yellow Pages for recycling.

The telephone directories are recycled into new paper by Abitibi-Consolidated Recycling Europe. The schools that collect the most directories per pupil will win a cash prize from Yellow Pages. Money will also go from Yellow Pages to support the Woodland Trust's tree-planting campaign.

This is the second year Chesterfield schools have been competing in the national “Yellow Woods Challenge”.

West Sussex county council is giving away 50,000 home composting “digesters” for residents over the next two years.

With the help of a 1.5 million grant from Defra, the county began by giving away 589 food waste digesters at a campaign held at the Rustinton Sainsbury's supermarket.

Normally selling for 66.90 each, the food waste digester is made by Green Cone Ltd and comes with a kitchen caddy to collect waste before taking it to the digester, together with a supply of accelerator powder to help break down the food waste quickly.

Another “green giveaway” event will see residents offered free digesters between 10am and 4pm at the Sainsbury's store in Worthing on February 26-27.

Cllr Steve Waight, West Sussex county council cabinet member for environment, said: “The aim of the digesters is to make significant savings not only on the amount of waste that goes to landfill, but also on the cost of what is an increasingly expensive and unsustainable method of disposing of waste.”

Otto has supplied Sandwell council with three Continental Lifts as part of a move to boost green waste collections in the metropolitan borough.

The vehicles will collect waste from 30,000 properties every fortnight between February and November and householders have been supplied with 240 litre wheeled bins.

Senior managers estimate this will divert some 7,000 tonnes of waste from landfill sites to composting and recycling and the scheme will eventually be extend to all 60,000 properties in the borough which have gardens.

Defra had set a 10% recycling target for Sandwell in 2003/04 but the final figures showed that the borough managed to recycle just 9%.

Recycling manager Brian Howells said: “Current waste collection still uses the black bag system, so the use of wheeled bins for green refuse collection is exciting and will point the way for future general refuse collections.

“We have 120,000 households, of which about 50% have gardens, so we will look to expand this scheme over coming years.”