Poole in race to save commingled recycling service

Councillors are meeting on Monday to discuss a proposal to develop a £14.5 million facility including a £8.6 million MRF and £2.9 million waste transfer station, working with contractor Viridor Waste Management.

A report issued prior to the meeting identified time as the “key pressure” facing the project, since the new MRF needs to be up and running by June 30, 2011. This is when the current contract to send collected commingled waste to Grosvenor's MRF in Kent runs out.

Under Viridor's 20-year contract with Poole, signed in September 2007 (see letsrecycle.com story), the waste firm can terminate its agreement in relation to the handling of recyclable materials, if it is not satisfied the recycling service can go ahead from 2011 in the absence of a new MRF.

Poole's officers said failure to build a new MRF would see the need to find new MRF capacity, if material is to be saved from landfill or the blue bin scheme completely shut down.

Recycling

Recycling rates in the borough have more than doubled since the scheme's introduction in September 2004.

Poole's inclusion of glass within its commingled system – which otherwise includes paper, plastic, cardboard and metal – would limit options for finding alternative MRF capacity, however, unless the glass can be removed before it is sent to a MRF. Only five MRFs in the UK currently accept glass, officers warned.

Moving to a kerbside box system of source separation was ruled out by council officers as being too expensive and difficult for householders to handle. A report to councillors said the blue bin scheme currently enjoys the highest resident satisfaction rate for any recycling scheme in Dorset at 84%, which it said “supports the view that the blue bin scheme is the right strategy”.

The scheme's participation rate is as high as 99%.

An appraisal of possible options, carried out by KPMG and due to be examined by Poole councillors on Monday, concludes that building a new MRF is the “right option”.

Commenting ahead of Monday's meeting of the Environment Overview Group, Cllr Don Collier, cabinet portfolio holder for the environment at Poole, said: “Our blue bin scheme has gone from strength to strength over the last three years and it has proved very popular with residents. We want to build on the success of the scheme and improve the efficiency of our recycling processes and creating our own MRF in Poole is an exciting way forward.”

Site

A site has been suggested at Hatch Pond for the new Plant, but Poole alone would not be able to fill the capacity for a new sorting plant. The borough generates about 15,000 tonnes of dry recyclables, but a new MRF could expect to double such a capacity.

The unitary borough hopes that Viridor could secure contracts to sort dry recyclables from a neighbouring authority like Bournemouth, which has a similar mix of recyclable materials collected to Poole.

Monday's meeting is likely to see councillors agreeing a £300,000 project to assemble a formal business case for the MRF project. Procurement for the new MRF and planning permission would be carried out from April 2008 until September 2009 under the suggested timetable, with construction taking place from October 2009 to March 2011.

The new MRF would also be likely to include a new waste transfer station, needed by Poole for the transportation of material to final disposal.