The contract, which was previously held by UK Waste (now absorbed into Biffa), has seen 14 new collection vehicles providing the SITA service.
A spokesman for the Kent borough said that residents are unlikely to notice any change in the service until April when the kerbside scheme will get underway.
Recycling in Ashford has failed to develop much beyond 11% with some of the success down to the local community recycling group Wyecycle. Ashford had been a potential site for an anaerobic digestor in the late 1990s but the controversial project, which won some support from Kent County Council, failed to get off the ground.
Now the council is reviewing its recycling strategy in light of the Government’s White Paper, “Making Waste Work”.
The white paper sets several national waste minimisation and recycling targets, one of which is to recycle or compost 25% of household waste by the year 2005.
Meanwhile, because of concerns among some residents about the lack of recycling facilities for plastic bottles in the borough, the council has taken the unusual step of asking residents to remove the tops from plastic bottles to allow them to be crushed and take up less landfill space. “With the lids left on, the pressure needed to burst the seals and flatten the bottles is immense,” a council statement said.
The borough says that the reason for the lack of plastic bottle recycling is the cost of 1,500 a tonne to sort and recycle the bottles.
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