Thanks to the
willingness of residents to make use of their local recycling
services, the current amount of household waste that is being
recycled rather than going into landfill rubbish tips is
around 45 per cent, which is well above the national
average.
Your rubbish is costing you the earth
We still need to divert more of the remaining hundreds of
tonnes of rubbish going into landfill as it is literally costing
the earth not to recycle more. Making it easier to recycle, and
encouraging more people to do it, is not just about protecting the
environment.
The Government levies a landfill tax on every tonne of rubbish
that goes into the local tips - in April 2008 this rose to £32 a
tonne. This tax is paid by residents through their Council Tax.
It has been estimated that if this district continues to throw
away 65 per cent of its household rubbish, the annual cost to
residents will be a staggering £9 million a year in 2019. That is
£3 million more than what Suffolk Coastal currently raises for its
services in a year.
Why we should recycle more and minimise our waste
There would be a massive financial saving for us all if we
increased our recycling, and it would also be a major benefit to
the environment. If we can recycle more, it will reduce the
consumption of raw materials and energy.
By cutting down the amount of waste we produce in the first
place and recycling and composting more of the waste we
can't avoid producing, we can reduce the amount that has to be
disposed of by burying it in landfill sites, thus reducing the
amount of valuable resource that has to be wasted in this way.
However, because our landfill sites are also filling up quickly
and only have a finite lifespan before they are full, we must
further reduce the amount of waste sent to landfill in order to
avoid incurring Government fines.
Suffolk County Council is therefore having to
investigate alternative methods (new window) of
dealing with the remaining residual waste that cannot be composted
or recycled, and whether there are options, such as energy from
waste schemes, which are more environmentally acceptable in
comparison to burying the waste in landfill.
Whichever method is finally put into place, it will still be far
more preferable for us to all
minimise the waste we produce we produce in the
first place, with recycling and composting being the next most
sustainable option, before energy from waste, with final disposal
to landfill being the least environmentally sustainable option.
Wheeled bin recycling services introduced
In the summer of 2006
a wheeled bin recycling service was launched
for over 9,000 homes in the district, giving people the chance
to have their cardboard, plastics, foil and cans collected every
fortnight. 9,500 more homes received the new service in 2007 and
another 18,400 will have it by the end of October 2008 bringing the
total to just under 37,000, or roughly two-thirds of the
district.
The Council plans to roll out this service to every home in the
district by the end of 2010.
Every home in the district can recycle all their food,
fruit and vegetable peelings by putting them in their brown bin
for green waste, thanks to a new high-technology
composting plant at Parham.
Residents are currently recycling a record 45 per cent
of their household waste, and those with the new wheeled
bin recycling service have been hitting 54 per cent.
Suffolk Coastal's partners in
recycling
Suffolk Coastal is
working in partnership with other
councils in the county to achieve a recycling and composting
rate of 60 per cent for all households by 2010.
The Council is committed to expanding its services to make it
even easier for everyone to recycle, and by working in partnership
with its residents it plans to stop rubbish costing you the
earth.