BFOE Reports and Responses

Reports & Responses

June 2004

Response to Review and Update of Birmingham City Council Waste Management Strategy

Summary

1. Birmingham City Council's 2000 Waste Management Strategy opened with a 'Vision' of more sustainable waste management practices such as waste minimisation, re-use and recycling being adopted for the City. Since then, however, the City Council has continued to rely heavily on incineration at the Tyseley energy from waste plant as the main method of waste treatment.

2. Birmingham Friends of the Earth (FoE) would like to use the opportunity of the Review to explore ways of turning Birmingham's poor recycling record around. By focusing on more environmentally sustainable ways of dealing with waste, the City Council can comfortably meet future targets on recycling and diversion from landfill.

3. For this document we have reviewed the City's current performance and have identified the following measures that would allow the Strategy's original vision to be realised:

Waste minimisation: the potential environmental gains from not generating so much waste in the first place can far exceed those of recycling.
Kerbside recycling schemes: these have been consistently demonstrated to increase recycling rates when practical and well publicised. Flexible schemes that can include hard-to-reach areas must form part of an overall plan.
Participation and awareness: Schemes that involve effective consultation with local people enjoy higher levels of participation. If residents are well informed about recycling services and are aware of the economic, social and environmental benefits to be gained, then participation will improve and longer term cultural change towards viewing waste as a resource will begin.

4. We also look at three case studies of how urban areas with similar demographic features to Birmingham have achieved high recycling rates.

5. Birmingham FoE welcomes the opportunity to participate in the review of the Birmingham Waste Management Strategy. Of course, it was unrealistic for a voluntary sector organisation like Birmingham FoE to draw up and submit a full Municipal Waste Strategy given the allotted time scale. Nevertheless, we are hopeful that the City Council will find the following submission a relevant and useful contribution to the review.

Kate Nancarrow
Waste and Resources Campaigner
Birmingham Friends of the Earth

1. Introduction: current treatment of waste and future targets

1.1. Birmingham's waste arisings are increasing against a backdrop of tighter legislation and higher national recycling targets. Birmingham has achieved high diversion rates from landfill via the Tyseley energy-from-waste plant but this dependence on incineration has masked poor recycling performance for some time and resulted in more sustainable ways of dealing with waste being neglected.

1.2. The City Council's contract with Tyseley Waste Disposal Ltd. requires 350,000-400,000 tonnes of waste to be delivered to the incinerator per annum for the duration of the contract. We are concerned that the need to supply the incinerator will compromise the success of future recycling schemes as well as weakening the political will to promote alternatives, like home composting, which remove waste from the waste stream at source.

1.3. The 'waste hierarchy' shown below places incineration second to last. We strongly urge against any move to increase the capacity of the incinerator and call on the City Council to seek re-negotiation of the contract as soon as is practicable.

The Waste Hierarchy [1]

i. waste minimisation
ii. re-use
iii. recovery through recycling or composting
iv. recovery through incineration
v. disposal via landfill

1.4. Birmingham generates approximately 534,185 tonnes of municipal waste per annum. This is currently dealt with as follows:

Municipal Waste Strategy in Birmingham 2000-2003 [2]

1.5. In 2002-2003 Birmingham recycled 8.5% and composted 2.3% (at central composting facilities) of household waste giving a total recycling rate of 10.8%. The 2003-2004 target is 10%, with estimates from pre-audited figures are approximately 13%. The 2005-2006 target is 18%, rising dramatically to 30% for 2010 - 2011.

2. The way forward: waste minimisation

2.1. Waste minimisation is the most environmentally friendly approach to waste as it saves resources and energy. The City Council's current approach to waste minimisation includes:

Subsidised home composters: approximately 16,000 purchased so far representing a 4% uptake.
Partnerships with other organisations such as Urban Mines, Groundwork Birmingham, Brumcan, the Real Nappy scheme, Community Transport, Ladywood Furniture Project.
Awareness raising through media and other advertising.

2.2. Encouraging home composting would achieve a significant and immediate reduction in domestic waste. Up to 35% of the contents of a domestic bin is compostable kitchen waste and 25% is paper, which can also be composted [3]. A scheme providing subsidised composters is in place in Birmingham but it is not widely advertised.

Recommendations

Conduct, or commission from a third party, research to ascertain levels of awareness of subsidised home composting bins, and barriers to participation.
Promote and publicise home composting through leafleting, local media etc.
Reduce the price of bins further or consider free supply; costs will be recouped via reductions in tonnage of waste collected. Labour saved on waste collection for landfill could then be reallocated to recycling collection services.
Set an example by reviewing suppliers and practices within the City Council itself with the aim of minimising waste.Promote with partners a waste minimisation scheme with a view to adopting a 'Zero Waste' strategy (see Box 1).

Box 1. Zero Waste initiatives
The concept of 'Zero Waste' originated in New Zealand represents a fundamental shift in the philosophy of waste management where all waste is re-classified as resources to be further used. It is similar to the concept of 'zero accidents' or 'zero defects' in manufacturing, where having a 'zero' target to strive for serves to encourage innovation and efficiency.

This radical approach has been adopted by several local authorities, including most notably Bath and North East Somerset, who are currently undertaking a studying ways to increase participation in the multiple recycling schemes they operate.

On top of making a commitment to meet current legislative requirements, Bath and NE Somerset Council are planning strategically to implement Zero Waste by focusing upon:

Promoting existing 'green box' kerbside collection and recycling centres;
Exploring the feasibility of the refurbishment and re-sale of bulky items collected at recycling centres;
Including kitchen waste, garden waste, and cardboard in the weekly kerbside collection;
Re-locating existing recycling facilities to a specifically commissioned 'Environment Park' in order to develop and expand these facilities.

3. The way forward: recycling

3.1. Paper: Accurately determining levels of participation is key to assessing a scheme's success or failure. The current 'Paper Round' kerbside collection scheme covers 324,000 of a total 404,000 households (80%) but accurate figures for the total uptake are not available. In this respect Birmingham is not unusual among the local authorities we looked at.

3.2. Green (garden) waste: A non-container Green Garden Waste trial involving 20,000 households recovered 318 tonnes over 13 weeks in 2003 and a pilot scheme to provide 60,000 households with wheeled bins is proposed for 2004-2005. However, the latter has attracted some negative publicity owing to the fact that weekly standard waste collections would be reduced to a fortnightly collection [4].

3.3. Our research suggests that higher recycling rates are best achieved through dedicated kerbside collections. In addition, Friends of the Earth recommends: [5]

A frequent (weekly) service on the same day as the general waste collection service.
A minimum of five recyclable materials collected.
Comprehensive and easily understood instructions, multilingual where necessary.
Easily storable collection containers.
Separation of recyclable materials on the doorstep to minimise contamination.

3.4. Other characteristics of successful schemes include:

Flexibility, especially with regard to hard-to-reach areas (see Box 3).
Initial publicity through leafleting and door-to-door, particularly in low uptake areas.
Initial consultation including workshops and consumer surveys.
Follow-up publicity.
Monitoring figures to judge success.
Involvement of community and schools-based action groups.

Box 2. Jobs and Recycling
Recycling offers considerable opportunities for creating formal 'green collar' employment. The Greater London Authority has estimated that, "Conservatively . . . the net creation of jobs in collection to be of the order 3-4 persons per 3,000 tonnes dry recyclables collected".6 Similarly, Waste Watch estimates that sorting and reprocessing at 25% recycling rates can create 20,000 jobs [7].

3.5. Until such time as the incinerator contract is re-negotiated, recycling rates can only be improved by 'tapping into' the remaining 130,000 tonnes of domestic waste that currently goes to landfill every year. Birmingham FoE believes there is much that can be achieved within the existing obligations and we would welcome the opportunity to work in partnership with the City Council to promote and raise awareness of recycling and its many benefits to the public in a positive, innovative way.

3.6. Research shows that the public would be willing to do more to help the environment given the chance. A MORI poll commissioned by the Environment Agency found that 73% of the English and Welsh questioned would do more 'if it would make a difference' [8]. There is no reason why Birmingham communities would not get behind waste minimisation and city-wide kerbside recycling schemes provided they are made easy to understand and well publicised.

3.7. In its 2001 report Rewarding Recycling [6], the Greater London Authority comments, "There is a common assumption that the rough correlation between social and economic deprivation and lower recycling rates is due to lack of enthusiasm. However, research by the Recycling Consortium following consultation with local people found that residents were just as aware of waste issues and that poor participation was usually a result of poor quality or inconvenient services and not lack of interest."

3.8. The role of Waste Collection Operatives could be broadened to include encouraging residents to participate in recycling and take pride in achieving a greener city. Residents must also see the tangible benefits for increased recycling in terms of, for example, community investment from the Landfill Tax Credit scheme or profits generated from recycled goods.

3.9. As a community group with a keen interest in seeing the City's recycling performance improve, Birmingham Friends of the Earth could, given appropriate support and resources, help to raise awareness and encourage participation in recycling by, for example, consulting with our supporters and the wider community on proposed schemes, and by publicising and promoting such a scheme should it be adopted.

Recommendations

Conduct, or commission from a third party, research to ascertain levels of awareness of the Paper Round scheme and barriers to participation. This would feed into a future communication strategy aimed at widening participation not just in terms of paper but other recyclable materials as well.
Expands existing recycling provision to include collections of five to eight recyclable materials by 2010.
Broaden the remit of Waste Collection Operatives to include working with communities on the doorstep to increase participation.
Publish performance data and the highest performing leading districts.
Research methods used by other local authorities to increase participation.
Maintain community recycling amenity sites to a high standard; some sites are still often found to be dirty and over-filled.
Ensure that new developments provide for the separate internal and/or external storage of separated recyclable materials [9].

Box 3. Hard-to-reach areas
Any scheme that aims at city-wide coverage must consider hard-to-reach areas such as high rise flats. East London Community Recycling Partnership (ELCRP) introduced an innovative tailored pilot composting scheme at a high rise block in East London involving door-to-door collection service and a microbiological system called Effective Micro-organisms or MEM Bokashi.

When added to the containers EM Bokashi culture halts the putrefaction of kitchen waste thereby reducing smell and gases. This is ideal for large estates with rodent problems. Collected waste is then added to a patented automatic on-site composting machine called a 'Rocket' which produces a product for use on the communal gardens.

Since January 2004 ELCRP have collected 12 tonnes of kitchen waste from 274 high rise households and achieved an 85% participation rate. The service is due to be extended to 5,000 households over the next three years.

4. Case Studies

4.1. Three local authorities that have adopted effective and innovative means of increasing their recycling rate in a mixed urban environment, albeit on a smaller scale than Birmingham, are the London Boroughs of Hounslow and Wandsworth and the City of Bristol.

4.2. Case study: London Borough of Hounslow [10]

4.2.1. The London Borough of Hounslow has a population of over 210,000, and more than 86,000 dwellings in total. Although comparatively small in relation to Birmingham, Hounslow has a similar density of population, and, significantly, a high proportion of flats, multiple-occupancy housing and high-rise tower blocks. In total, 37.3% of the population of Hounslow reside in flats, 24% of which are above ground floor making kerbside recycling schemes impractical. Similarly, Birmingham has over 90,000 flats, 22.4% of the overall population [11].

4.2.2. In partnership with a not-for-profit company, ECT Recycling, Hounslow's strategy aimed to deliver three schemes designed to catch all residents regardless of their form of accommodation.

4.2.3. For the 70,000 ground level households, a kerbside 'Green Box' recycling scheme is provided. Weekly collections (on the same day as general refuse collection) handle the following dry recyclables: paper; domestic cardboard; telephone directories; glass jars and bottles; food tins and drink cans; textiles; clothes and shoes; aluminium foil; motor oil; household and car batteries; and aerosols.

4.2.4. The collection crews separate the materials collected at kerbside in order to minimise contamination. The inclusion of plastics in the weekly collection will be negotiated when the current contract with ECT Recycling expires.

4.2.5. In addition, Hounslow operates a weekly near-entrance estate frame scheme similar to those operated fortnightly in Birmingham, comprising 260 small near-entrance recycling sites for all medium and high-rise estates.

4.2.6. However, a study conducted by the Council found that medium-sized blocks of flats (typically16-29 units) could not benefit from either the kerbside green box scheme, as they did not have access to the ground floor, nor, owing to space issues, from the large estate frame scheme.

4.2.7. To reach these households, the Council, in partnership with a manufacturer, custom-developed and introduced a 'Hybrid' [12] of both the doorstep and high-rise systems, using four-wheeled units with removable compartments or drawers for each type of material. This highly flexible approach allows the collection of up to three different materials per bin and extra bins can be added to increase overall capacity. It also enabled the authority to serve medium-sized blocks with standard kerbside operations, and thus avoid complicating and fragmenting recycling provision with multiple contracts [13].

4.2.8. Hounslow's Recycling Officer, Mr. F Thompson, told us that the weight of the materials deposited in the Hybrid system for recycling was on average equal to, and in some areas significantly greater than, the weight of materials collected through the green-box kerbside scheme. In some areas up to 5kg of recyclables were collected per week.

Recommendations

Undertake a study of the number of medium-sized flats that would benefit from a system similar to Hounslow's Hybrid scheme with a view to adopting a similar system for Birmingham;
Increase efficiency and offset infrastructure costs by employing the same crew of operatives to handle any hybrid scheme as those responsible for doorstep collection.
Where kerbside and hybrid systems are not practicable, i.e. in high-rise flats with excess of 29 units, and no recycling facilities are currently available, introduce near-entrance estate frames;
Service currently operating estate frames on a weekly basis;
Where space allows, provide for more recyclables to be collected.

4.3. Case study: London Borough of Wandsworth

4.3.1. One of London's largest Boroughs, Wandsworth has a multi-ethnic population and a high proportion of multiple occupancy residences. Debbie Gill, Wandsworth's Recycling Officer, told us that the Borough is expecting to achieve a recycling rate for 2003 - 2004 of 17.5%, up from 10.5% in 2002 - 2003.

4.3.2. Recently, to encourage participation, the weekly multiple sack collection service for ground level properties and low-rise blocks was replaced by a weekly single orange sack collection. Participation is 'opt out', not 'opt in': sacks are now delivered automatically to all households every three months, unlike under the old system where residents had to contact the Council for replacement sacks.

4.3.3. The Council opted for see-through orange sacks rather than a box scheme because sacks are quicker for the operatives to collect and residents can put as many sacks out each week as they like, whereas only a single box could be put out, limiting the amount collected each week. A simple leaflet with pictures of recyclable goods is attached to sacks. Upon collection, contaminated sacks are left with a sticker explaining why the sack was rejected.

4.3.4. Wandsworth saw a 120% increase in the quantity of materials being collected almost immediately after the single sack scheme was introduced. Contamination rates are less than 5%, so the increased amount collected far outweighs the contamination.

4.4. Case study: City of Bristol

4.4.1. Bristol City Council achieved a recycling rate of 13.8% in 2002/03 [14], the key to its success being the comprehensive coverage offered by the service and the broad range of materials collected.

4.4.2. Bristol's doorstep recycling service collects in excess of five recyclable materials (paper and magazines; green, brown and clear glass; aluminium and steel cans; aluminium foil; textiles; batteries and oil) using a 44 litre black box on a weekly basis coinciding with refuse collection. Recyclables are separated at kerbside by the collection crews.

4.4.3. The scheme boasts a coverage exceeding 95% of households, with the exception of some multiple occupancy buildings and high-rises. Near-entrance estate frames cover 10,000 excluded from the kerbside scheme.

4.4.4. Bristol is impressive in that it manages to deliver in a densely populated urban environment a recycling service comparable to those of local authorities such as Dacorum, Daventry and Lichfield, noted for their high recycling rates. We can infer from this that the urban environment is not necessarily an insurmountable impediment to the delivery of an exemplary recycling scheme.

Notes

1. Taken from the Government's Way With Waste draft strategy, 2000.

2. Brief on the Review and Updating of the Birmingham Waste Management Strategy, May 2004. Birmingham City Council, 2004.

3. See www.foe.co.uk/campaigns/waste/issues/reduce_reuse_recycle/index.html

4. Birmingham Post, 1st June 2004 and 18th May 2004.

5. Doorstep recycling: a good practice guide and local authority case studies. Friends of the Earth, June 2004. See www.foe.co.uk/resource/reports/doorstep_recycling_good_practice.pdf

6. Rewarding recycling: an Assembly investigation into barriers to recycling in London, June 2001. Greater London Authority, 2001.

7. Jobs from waste: employment opportunities in recycling, London. Waste Watch, 1999.

8. Quoted in Your Environment, Spring 2004.

9. As recommended by the Black Country Housing Association in their Eco-Home Standard.

10. See www.hounslow.gov.uk/home/a-z_services/r/recyclinggreenbox.htm

11. Based on 2001 Census. See www.neighbourhoodstatistics.gov.uk

12. For an overview of Hounslow's Hybrid system see the 2004 DEFRA report Recycling for flats, www.wasteonline.org.uk/resources/WasteWatch/RecyclingFromFlats_DefraWW1.pdf

13. Recycling for flats. DEFRA, 2004, www.wasteonline.org.uk/resources/WasteWatch/RecyclingFromFlats_DefraWW1.pdf

14. Who wears the Recycling Crown? Resource no.16, May-June 2004, p24-8.

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