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Waste Strategy
This is intended as a discussion document for the Rhondda Waste Forum, a
consultaton set up by the Council to involve the waste industry and the
community.
It is not a proposal for a particular project, but rather a suggested
approach to evaluating projects. A number of desirable features are
listed, not in the expectation that all projects will address all points,
but rather
It is intended to be neither definitive nor exclusive. It intention, is
however, to get away from a "single problem - single solution" framework of
thinking, the result of which is likley to leave recycling activity
fragmented and limited.
It may that the various objectives can best be met by a number of projects
working in collaboration.
To act as stimulus to discussion a specific example is listed, which may
illustrate some of the pitfalls involved in some forms of promotion of
recycling activity. It is not intended as a criticism of those involved and
no specific details such as names are mentioned.
Example - Recycling Bale Wrappings
A small family company has achieved a grant under European Objective 5 in
order to collect plastic bale wrappings for recycling.
The bale wrappings consist of a tough inner plastic and an outer wrapping of
a more common plastic material. The characteristics required of the
inner wrapping makes it impossible or impractical to make it out of
recycled material.
The inner wrapping, however, can be recycled into a wood substitute which
can be used for fences, gates, etc. It appears to be quite vandal-proof,
making it attractive for use as street furniture in urban areas.
The reprocessing can, at present, take place in only one place in Europe -
in Scotland.
The company uses the grant to collect the inner wrappings from farms and
ship them to Scotland for reprocessing.
Unfortunately the grant is insufficient to enable the company to provide
the collection of the wrappings as a free service and farmers are being
charged to have the material taken away. Some farmers are reluctant to
pay, particularly because it is a solution to disposing of only part of
the wrapping material. The farmer is still left with the problem of
disposing of the outer wrappings.
{Discussion}
The scheme has one very strong point, namely a particularly useful product
can be made from a material which would otherwise be difficult to recycle.
There are, however, a number of important limitations and concerns.
The lengthy transport route means that the project is contributing to both
pollution and fuel consumption.
The collection visits to the farms could be used to collect the outer
wrappings (which presumably could be recycled for the same use) but
because this is excluded from the grant, this is not being done.
From the famers' point of view it is not a solution to their waste problem,
something which may lead to the uncontrolled burning of plastics. There
are strong environmental concerns about such activity, particularly from
the point of releasing dioxins into the atmosphere.
A Stategy in preference to specific solutions to specific problems
The above case illustrates the problems of supporting projects on the
basis of financing a single activity.
A strategy should not describe a specific endpoint, but rather indicate
what is desirable and be open as to new ideas as to how objectives can
be achieved.
Employment, Education and Training
A key aspect of any project is the opportunity to provide immediate employment
as well as increasing the education and skills of the workforce.
Recycling activity offers the oppotuinity to acquire a number of
transferable skills:
Communication and Interpersonal Skills. There will be a considerable
level of coordination and liasing between groups, individuals and
businesses.
IT and administration skills - gathering and storing information
(see Intelligence below) and record keeping will be activities
central to any project.
Environmental awareness. Those working on projects will need to understand
the significance of their work. Increasingly businesses will need to
be aware of the consequences in terms of the environment and resources of
their activities. The Welsh Assembly has recently committed itself to the
principle of sustainable development.
Science. Recycling activity represents a marvellous opportunity to
learn science in a practical environement.
The area of plastics recycling is a particularly fertile area to learn
to learn about the polymer chemistry as well as the specific processes
involved in producing plastics.
Landfill and incineration represent "unintelligent" solutions to the waste
management problem. Whether industrial or domestic the sources of the
waste are easily identified and predictable and all waste is disposed
in the same way.
Recycling involves separating waste and treating different components
in different ways. It requires intelligence relating to who is producing
what waste and where, and who is a potential user of waste materials, and
where.
Recycling activity therefore requires research in order to be effective.
One approach is to set up a Waste Exchange. One Waste Exchange exists
already for Wales (www.waste-exchange.org) but this appears to be very
limited. On a recent visit I looked for potential consumers of waste under
a number of categories. Every category I looked at was empty.
This appears to support anecdotal evidence that the main obstacle to
recycling at present appears to be the problem of finding places willing
to reprocess waste.
It also indicates that current levels of intelligence regarding reprocessing
activity is woefully inadequate.
Any recycling projects undertaken are unlikely to be very successful unless
there is parallel research activity. Anything undertaken needs to be more
locally based and more comprehensive than anything undertaken to date.
I have described elsewhere (
Waste Exchanges
) what I consider to be the minimum requirements for a successful waste
exchange.
Identifying and promoting waste reprocessing
Currently recycling appears to be limited by a lack of companies willing
to accept waste for reprocessing.
In addition to identifying companies already active in waste reprocessing,
the intelligence gathering process should also be able to identify "market
gaps" where companies could become active. They could be attracted to the
area by reasonably assured markets in additional to any financial subsidies.
One particular gap appears to be the recycling of newspapers into newsprint.
Newspapers are both produced and consumed locally but there is at present
no system locally for reprocessing the newsprint.
Hopefully other potentially fruitful reprocessing opportunities can be
identified.
Integration and Extension
As projects are undertaken experiences will indicate further developments
which may be viable.
If further finance is required it should be on the basis of additional
benefits vs. additional {marginal} costs, which may be small if it involves
only a minor modification of existing activity.
Extending the bale wrapping recycling to include the outer wrapping would
be an example of such an extension.
If the materials can be sold for more than the addional cost of collection,
this would reduce the subsidy needed to make the project viable. Those
undertaking projects should be encouraged to look for opportunities to
sensibly extend their projects.
Recycling Hierarchy
It is important to establish a hierarchy of recycling activity, of which
the following is a suggestion:
Waste reduction and waste avoidance - e.g. promote reusable bottles
Reuse of production scrap - e.g. offcuts in sheet-metal production
Recycling waste for the same same or similar reuse - e.g. recylcing
newsprint
Recycling waste for lower value use than the original - e.g. making
plastic containers using waste from a variety of sources
Use for composting and mulch
Incineration or landfill
Projects should be evaluated on their position in the hierarchy, in addition
to other factors mentioned in this document.
Minimising transport - keeping things local
Energy costs should be considered a negative factor when judging projects.
Transport is likely to be a significant component of the energy cost for
many projects and therefore projects which involve local reprocessing and
local reuse.
Removing toxic materials from the waste stream
However the residual waste is disposed of, its burden on the environment
will be less if toxic materials have been removed.
Batteries of all sorts represent a particular environmental hazard.
Some countries oblige companies who produce batteries to accept used
batteries in exchange.
Landfill and Incineraton - keeping options open
One fundamental difference between landfill and incineration is that landfills
have a lifetime capacity whereas burning has a rate capacity.
Landfills will always be fully used in time. Incineration plants, on the
other hand, have a rate capacity. This means that if the amount of
residual waste declines, then there is the risk of bearing the capital cost
of unused capacity.
The pressure to make viable the capital expenditure on any incineration plant
built could stifle recycling activity or any other activity (such as waste
reduction) which decreases the amount of residual waste.
Proceding with building incineration plant should, therefore, procede with
extreme caution.
Incineration invokes concerns relating to emissions, prticularly dioxins.
The danger is increased if incineration of waste is undertaken in the absence
of recycling activity, which could remove much of the toxic material from
the waste stream.
Incineration also suffers from being capital intensive, with significantly
less opportunity for creating employment than equivalent money spent in
recycling.
Potential Partners
Existing waste companies
Local companies with experience of recycling
Community groups - especially those with experience of recycling -
but not excluding others
Individuals who can offer particular skills and experience
Summary of Plus and Minus Points for evaluating projects
{Plus Points}
Labour intensive
Opportunities for improving workforce skills
Research leading to improved recycling in the future
Quantity of material recycled and its position of the Recycling Hierarchy
Improving public awareness of environmental and recycling issues
Removing toxic materials from the waste stream
Flexibility to permit future extension or modification
Local reprocessing and reuse
Well integrated with other activities
{Minus Points}
Capital intensive
Limited to manual jobs with little opportunity to learn new skills
Large energy use - long distance transport
Project itself is a source of pollution
Inflexible - incapable of extension - poorly integrated with other
recycling activities
Outcomes
The same criteria used for selection should be used for determining outcomes.
Outcomes should include at least some quantitative targets for each project,
but also include some qualitative outcomes (eg. description of activities
which aim to raise awareness of recycling amongst schoolchildren).
Sufficient flexibility should be maintained in setting targets to permit
modification or extension in the light of experience.
Preliminary research should be undertaken to determine activities which are
most likely to make the most significant contribution (in the long term as
well as in the short term) to waste reduction.
Information should be regarded as a useful commodity and the provision of
useful information should be regarded as a successful outcome. Any information
produced by subsidised activity activity should (unless there are clear and
declared reasons for keeping it confidential) be placed in the Public Domain
with free access to anyone to reproduce or transform, so long as the original
source is acknowledged.
In addition to quantity, the success of information-generating projects
should be judged according to:
-Accuracy
-Timeliness - Is it up-to-date?
-Relevance - Are those who are able to use the information able to access
easily it in a format which meets their needs?
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This page was last updated on 5 November 2000 __________
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