Recycling and residual waste collections in North Ayrshire will take place every three weeks from April 2019 alongside a fortnightly food and green waste service.
The changes, which will be rolled out in stages, come after the council voted in favour of implementing measures to meet the Scottish governments recycling target of 60% by 2020.
North Ayrshire is a hung council with both Labour and the SNP having 11 councillors – pictured: North Ayrshire council offices
Residents will receive an additional purple bin solely for cans, plastics and glass with the current blue bin being kept for paper and cardboard only. Both of these recycling bins will be collected on a three-weekly cycle along with the grey general waste bin.
The service will be supported by a hygiene waste collection which can be requested for households that need to dispose of nappies and non-clinical medical related waste. This, along with the brown bin, for food and garden waste, would be collected fortnightly.
The council told letsrecycle.com that there will be an initial capital outlay of around £1.5M for the provision of the additional recycling bins and for two additional collection vehicles required to implement the new fortnightly hygiene waste collection service.
North Ayrshire has a population of 135,000 and is largely a rural area and includes the Isle of Arran.
In North Ayrshire, the recorded recycling rate for 2016 was 55.3%. The council has said that that the performance during 2017 indicated that a similar rate will be achieved.
Zero Waste Strategy
The proposals form part of an overall ‘Zero Waste Strategy 2018-2022’ and aim to increase recycling to over 60% by 2020, to meet the Scottish Government’s ‘Zero Waste Plan’ recycling targets. This target will increase further to 70% by 2025.
The zero waste plan proposals were passed in a council cabinet meeting on December 12, where the cabinet agreed to approve the strategy and implement it next year.
Council minutes from the meeting stated that members were provided with further information on behavioural change which is required in terms of household recycling, the introduction of communal bins as a pilot for common areas and flatted accommodation, and potential concerns in relation to storage of an extra 2 section bin.
The full implementation plan is currently being drawn up by councillors, however the three weekly bin collections and a new recycling bin have been confirmed.
Councillor Jim Montgomerie, a member of the Scottish council cabinet, commented that the Zero Waste plan “sets down a number of changes to collection methodologies that will support greater recycling and help divert some of the 71% of recyclable material that on average is disposed of within the grey residual waste bin away from disposal.”
He added: “These changes will be supported by a comprehensive programme of support for residents to help them make North Ayrshire a more environmentally sustainable area and meet national requirements”.
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Source: letsrecycle.com Waste Managment
