Vale of White Horse to top English recycling league

Two councils in Oxfordshire look set to top the recycling, composting and reuse league table for England in 2011/12 with Vale of White Horse in pole position, an exclusive letsrecycle.com survey has found.

According to provisional data collected from the top performing waste collection authorities for the last financial year, Vale of White Horse andSouth Oxfordshire district councils, which have a joint waste collection service,appear to have pulled ahead of last year’s top performer, Rochford, in Essex, which sits third. Another Oxfordshire local authority, West Oxfordshire, also features in the top ten.

The achievement hasbeen welcomed by recycling minister Lord Taylor. The letsrecycle.com findings come ahead of the publication of the official figures by Defra which are due in November 2012.

Vale of White Horse achieved a 68.8% provisional combined recycling, reuse and composting rate for the year, followed by South Oxfordshire at 68.25%. Both councils have been operating a joint waste collection service over the past two years, delivered by contractor Biffa.

Rise

Vale of White Horse councils overall provisional recycling and composting rate increased byalmost seventeen percentage pointsyear-on-year and the council looks set to rise39 places in the league table should it be confirmed by Defra as being in the number one spot.

“I think we should admire and applaud Vale of White Horse”
Lord Taylor of Holbeach

Rochfordachieved 67.4%.The Essexlocal authoritywas crowned the top performer in 2010/11 with an overall rate of 65.79% and appears to have gained a further 1.6%.

Surrey Heath recorded the highest dry recycling rate with 40.0%. In the letsrecycle.com survey,Harborough had the highest composting rate with 42.46% but was let down by a dry recycling rate of 19.03%.

‘Tremendous’

Commenting on the achievement by Vale of White Horse, recycling minister Lord Taylor of Holbeach said: It is tremendous the rate that they have achieved as they are getting very near to that magical 70%.

I think we should admire and applaud Vale of White Horse for getting this but what it also points out is that there is a huge variation in the rate of recycling. This suggests there are other local authorities which could do far more and bring considerable benefits for householders by recycling a lot more than they do.

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Top waste collection authorities for recycling in 2011/12*

*please note figures are provisional and there may be fluctuations. Additions may also include a non-listed figure for re-use.

Staffordshire Moorlands suffered a decrease in its overall rate in the past year, as did Cotswolddistrict counciland Stratford-upon-Avon,all of which dropped out of the top ten.Other high performers in this year’s survey which did not make the top ten include: South Cambridgeshire, Teignbridge and Lichfield.

Research suggests that West Oxfordshire is this years biggest climber, rising 146 places into5th. Three Rivers appears to have risen 44 places to 7th with an overall rate of 60.43%.

Stockport is the highest performing metropolitan borough council for the year, with a provisional recycling rate of 62.61%.

Vale of White Horse

The Vale of White Horse isa rural district in south-west Oxfordshire with a population of 120,000 and centres on the town of Abingdon. The councilrolled out its current service with waste and recycling firm Biffa in October 2010.

The service is run jointly with neighbouring South Oxfordshire district council and sees dry recyclables including paper and card, glass, cans, aerosols, foil, plastic bottles and packaging and food and drink cartons collected in green wheeled bins on alternate weeks to residual waste in grey wheeled bins.

The council also oversees food waste collections on a weekly basis and has a strict policy of not collecting side waste. Garden waste is collected fortnightly at a cost of 37 per annum. The service currently caters for over 51,000 properties across the district.

According to the council, the recycling service has been embraced by residents.

Speakingto letsrecycle.com, Ian Matten, waste manager at Vale of White Horse, commented on the success: I am proud to see the progress we have made this year, the first full year under our new contract.

Residents of this district have responded well to our easy-to-use system, and our strict refuse collection policy has yielded very promising results. Now its up to us to make sure residents dont get complacent so together we can retain the high standard that has been set.

South Oxfordshire

Both Vale of White Horse and South Oxfordshire collect recyclables commingled in wheeled bins which are then taken to Biffas materials recycling facilities (MRFs) for sorting, as opposed to the source separation system favoured by some other councils.

There was controversy last year when results published by Defra in November did not match the data recorded by South Oxfordshire for its recycling rates (see letsrecycle.com story) after it was claimed the council was the first to break the 70% barrier.

The inaccuracy was attributed to problems with MRF efficiency and rejection rates.

However, Mr Matten voiced his confidence that this years data would be more accurate. He said: Last year all composition analysis was conducted at the MRFs themselves; we have since introduced analysis on our own sites to help clear up the issue of rejection rates. We are hopeful this will lend greater accuracy to our data this time around.

Rochford

In Rochford, Essex, the local authority operates a three bin system one for residual waste, one for garden and kitchen waste and one for dry recyclables including glass, tins and cans, plastic, newspapers and magazines and cardboard. The bin for green and food waste is collected weekly by contractor SITA UK, while the other two are collected on alternate weeks.

In addition, residents can also place textiles out for recycling in bags provided by Essex Textiles.

Commenting on the success of the scheme, Rochford district council’s portfolio holder for the environment, Councillor Mike Steptoe, said: “Having been named by DEFRA as the top local authority in the country for recycling rates last year, I’m pleased to say that our rate has improved again from 65.79% to 67.4%.

There’s no secret to our continued success with recycling. It’s down to the fantastic relationship the council enjoys with our residents who are so receptive to our scheme and work so hard to recycle as many materials as possible.

For a small authority such as ourselves to achieve such high recycling rates is fantastic and we look forward to seeing the official DEFRA figures again later this year.”

‘We can be the best’

West Oxfordshire was another Oxfordshire district to enjoy success, climbing tofifth place in the provisional league table after a new seven year collection contract was signed with May Gurney in October 2010.

And, as operations manager Bob Lightfoot told letsrecycle.com, there is still room to improve: Im pleased with our results but we can definitely do better, particularly with dry recycling collections.

20% of recyclable items still go in the bin; if we can change this, we can easily achieve over 80% overall. I can certainly see us being the best-performing council in the coming years.”

Residents of West Oxfordshire have their general recycling, including batteries and textiles, and food waste collected weekly. Garden waste is collected fortnightly free of charge. The service now boasts over 35,000 customers across the district.

The success of the three Oxfordshire districts follows an announcement by the Oxford Waste Partnership (OWP) on July 12 of an impressive average rate of 60.14% across all districts in the county.

Cllr David Dodds, chairman of the OWP, said: “We are delighted with the recycling levels achieved in Oxfordshire and we are very proud that South Oxfordshire, Vale of White Horse and West Oxfordshire districts find themselves amongst the highest recyclers in the country.

We have worked through the Oxfordshire Waste Partnership to develop greater collection and treatment capacity. The schemes we have in place are good value and achieve excellent results. Credit must also go to local residents who have really embraced our recycling schemes.”

Stockport

Stockport metropolitan borough council in Greater Manchesterlooks set to be the countrys top performing urban collection authority this year with 62.61%.

The council run a four wheelie bin system, overseen by a council-operated services provider SolutionsSK. Food and garden waste is collected weekly free of charge, paper and card are collected fortnightly and glass and metal items on a monthly basis.

As with Vale of White Horse, Stockport uses MRF separation of the brown bin material, which, according to the council, allows a wide range of material to be conveniently collected. As with Vale, improving the quality of analysis and reducing contamination to minimise the MRF reject rate remains a high priority.

Stuart Jackson, Stockport councils service director place management, said: This performance has help us avoid landfill and disposal costs of over 10 million since we started our changes back in 2007. The dedication of our staff and contractor (Solutions SK) has been crucial in making the service so successful.

Councillor Kevin Hogg, Stockport councils executive member for public realm, said: Stockport has one of the best recycling rates in the country thanks to the fantastic efforts of borough residents who are keen and committed recyclers.

Thanks to these excellent recycling efforts we have reduced the amount of waste being sent to landfill by tens of thousands of tonnes. However, we remain committed to recycling even more waste in the future.

Welcomed

The provisional recycling league table was welcomed by the Local Authority Recycling Advisory Committee (LARAC), which represents council recycling officers.

Mark Foxall, LARAC vice chair, said: “These provisional figures look great and to haveeight authorities over 60% is without doubt a fantastic achievement.

“Congratulations to Vale of White Horse in particular and all those local authorities in the top ten.Those at the vanguard of recycling are always an inspiration to the rest of the local authority sector. Scotland and Wales have already set themselves ambitious 70% targets for future years and maybe next year we will see the first local authority to achieve this, who will it be?”