The Hertfordshire Waste Partnership (HWP) has announced that it saw a 7.1% reduction in waste going to landfill in 2016/17, with the overall recycling and composting rate jumping 1.8% to 52.2%.
Formed in 1992, the partnership brought together ten borough and district councils from across Hertfordshire, in their capacity as waste collection authorities and the county council as the waste disposal authority. There are currently 11 partner authorities in the scheme.
The HWP released its progress report for the year this week, which showed that it dealt with approximately 512,000 tonnes of waste during 2016/17 at a cost of approximately £82.47 million. Of this, £43.1 million was spent on waste treatment and disposal with the remainder spent on collection services.
HWP totals
HWP released its 16/17 report earlier this week
The combined HWP total saw recycling rise 1.8% to 52.2% last year, alongside the amount of waste sent for energy recovery, which increased by 26,000 tonnes to 179,000 tonnes for the year.
Last year’s figures also show saw all but one of the HWP’s partner authorities improved overall levels of recycling with significant increases noted in St Albans and Welwyn Hatfield.
In July 2016, St Albans implemented significant changes to their kerbside waste and recycling services which saw the provision of smaller 180 litre bins for residual waste together with a new weekly food waste collection service as well as an enhanced service for mixed dry recyclables.
“These changes resulted in St Albans showing the biggest improvement in recycling performance during 2016/17 with the full year effect likely to push St Albans to 60%+ recycling by March 2018,” the report said.
Herts county council was the only authority to record a drop, falling by 2.4% to 60.8%.
Fly tipping
The report also highlighted that more than 68% of fly-tipping reports relate to domestic waste. The report stated: “The fact that 60% – 70% of the annual totals are shown to be domestic in nature indicates that the majority of fly tipping takes place when domestic waste ‘leaks’ from established waste management systems including domestic refuse collections, bulky household waste collections or Household Waste Recycling Centres.”
However, on private land there are no reporting requirements, and such information can only be provided if private landowners are able to provide it.
The report stated that the majority of fly tipping takes place when domestic waste ‘leaks’ from established waste management systems
During 2015/16 there were 14,710 reported instances of fly tipping in Hertfordshire. By the end of 2016/17 this number had grown to 15,216.
The report said that despite “portrayals in the media giving the impression that fly tipping is as a result of deliberate actions by rogue traders” approximately two thirds of the fly tipping across the county is actually domestic which stems from actions taken by individuals who mostly do not consider what they are doing to be fly tipping.
Reaction
In the foreword, a joint statement from executive member for waste management Terry Hone and executive member for Environment Helen Bromley, explained that the report shows that out of every 100 tonnes of household waste produced in Hertfordshire, only 11½ tonnes was sent to landfill.
“During 2016/17 the HWP achieved further improvements in performance as a result of ongoing changes to waste and recycling services provided by a number of the partner authorities,” the joint statement read.
It added that whilst these further improvements are to be welcomed “the HWP is also grappling with a range of significant risks ranging from ongoing reductions in government funding to the potential impacts of Brexit.”
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Source: letsrecycle.com Waste Managment
