Memorandum submitted by Oxfordshire County
Council
Innovative Solutions to Waste Management Problems—The
Committee has decided that the terms of reference of the inquiry
should be: "Taking account of the on-going inquiry by the
Environmental Audit Committee into current and past practice.
As well as the report from the Government's Strategy Unit, the
Committee will examine what steps should in future be taken in
order to move waste management up the "waste hierarchy"
as set out in the Waste Framework Directive."
Areas which we should cover and which Oxfordshire
can provide evidence for:
HOME COMPOSTING
The Government decided to exclude home composting
from local authority targets for the following reasons:
— There is no accurate auditable methodology
currently for determining how much waste is treated in this way.
Oxfordshire County Council have been carrying
out weighing trials for people using home composters in Oxfordshire,
and therefore can accurately measure the amount of kitchen and
garden waste which residents home compost. Expansion of this weighing
trial is technically feasible, and eminently auditable. Figures
from carrying out this weighing are real figures for the real
diversion of waste from the waste stream, and therefore equate
to the measurement of centralised composting schemes.
— There is a need to assess objectively
the benefits of home composting. When done badly home composting
can have a number of negative effects including attracting vermin
and producing methane.
Oxfordshire have objectively assessed the benefits
of home composting through carrying out research work and large-scale
customer satisfaction surveys. This has found that:
(a) Of all residents who have bought compost
bins, only 2% of customers have identified vermin as a potential
issue. Furthermore, there is no evidence that of this 2%, that
vermin are attracted to the compost bin specifically, and that
they would not be present in the garden (underneath a shed or
other structure) anyway.
(b) Using methane-monitoring equipment, Oxford
Brookes University assessed the levels of methane given off by
home composting, and found them to be similar to background levels
of methane. There has been no research evidence I am aware of
that links home composting to methane production.
— Woody garden wastes can generally
be handled by central composting facilities but not by home composters.
In the absence of central schemes woody wastes are often burned.
Home composters are able to handle small amounts
of woody wastes—in fact they provide an excellent structural
element for successful home composting. Oxfordshire County Council,
as with other Waste Disposal Authorities, provide eight collection
points for these woody wastes (although in the summer, 60% of
all our material we compost is grass clippings which could be
home composted). Therefore, home composting does not lead to woody
wastes being burnt.
WASTE MINIMISATION
Evidence from Oxfordshire suggests that Local
Authorities can ably engage with the public with a range of educational
and information programmes. These can help to reduce the rate
of growth of household waste, and therefore actually reduce the
rate of growth in relation to the growth of GDP within a County
area.
Oxfordshire has been running a co-ordinated
programme of waste reduction with its residents over the past
three years. Over this time, growth has averaged at 1.5% per annum,
well below the economic growth levels in Oxfordshire and increase
in demographic growth rates over this period, indicating a decoupling
of waste growth from economic growth, and therefore indicates
overall waste reduction.
The Waste Reduction Programme has included the
following elements that we recommend should be included in all
Authority led programmes:
— Schools education programmes using
peripatetic classrooms.
— Intensive home composting programme,
including the provision of subsidised composters and free trials.
— Co-ordinated press and publicity
programme to keep the public fully informed, through the local
press, of measures which they can take to reduce waste.
— Community Action Groups programme—engaging
with local communities to help them to identify solutions for
themselves.
— Washable nappies programme to help
new mothers to reduce the impact that disposable nappies have
on the environment. We are working with the John Radcliffe to
help them to introduce washable nappies into their maternity unit.
— Junk Mail Programme—providing
residents with a hotline and tools to stop the menace of junk
mail in the home, and stop free newspapers coming through the
door.
CONTROL OF
COMMERCIAL WASTE
ENTERING CIVIC
AMENITY SITES
(WASTE RECYCLING
CENTRES):
Oxfordshire has also been successful in reducing
the amount of commercial wastes that have wrongly been entering
CA Sites (called Waste Recycling Centres in Oxfordshire), through
a combination of increased site controls and changes to site design.
An example of the success that Oxfordshire has had is shown by
the reductions in waste input at its Redbridge Waste Recycling
Centre once security personnel were posted at the front of the
site.
Waste inputs in 1997-98 were 19,175 tonnes.
In 1998, the Redbridge contract was re-tendered to include the
provision of a security guard at the front of the site to reduce
the abuse of traders at the site. Site inputs reduced, year by
year, to 12,911 tonnes by 2000-01.
Oxfordshire County Council supports a number
of reports submitted to the Cabinet Office, including the report
by Green Alliance entitled "Creative policy packages for
waste: lessons for the UK". There are a number of particularly
important policy areas which the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
Committee should assess and promote to Government Ministers and
Departments.
SOLUTIONS FOR
IMPROVING THE
SUSTAINABLE MANAGEMENT
OF WASTES:
— Reduce VAT on goods that are made
from recycled materials.
— Increases in landfill tax, with returns
from this recycled to sustainable resource management.
— Increase taxes on primary materials,
thereby stimulating secondary material demands.
— Allow Waste Authorities to charge
householders for the use of Waste Recycling Centres, and for volume/weight
based collections from the curtilage of householders premises.
— Introducing producer responsibility
for all hazardous wastes would reduce waste toxicity and increase
recovery of hazardous wastes.
— Unitary resource management authorities
are essential (suggested in the Strategy Unit Report).
— Enhanced producer responsibility
regulations, with more deposits paid on consumer items to encourage
return and recovery.
— A full and detailed Public Awareness
Campaign on the reason why businesses and residents should reduce,
reuse and recycle.
— The NHS needs to have a comprehensive
policy and procedure for how it is going to deal with disposable
nappies within its maternity units.
Oxfordshire County Council
6 January 2003
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