Big rise in borough's recycling

Council reports rise of 15% .....

The amount of waste that Wandsworth residents recycled or composted last year shot up 15 per cent, according to new figures.

The tonnage of household waste that was recycled or composted rose from just over 18,000 tonnes to more than 21,000 tonnes, councillors will be told at the evening meeting on 15th June.

The council's popular Orange sack doorstep recycling service collected an extra nine per cent of waste compared to the previous year.

And the amount deposited in Orange recycling banks - situated on council owned and private housing estates - rose by 270 per cent. Around 2,700 tonnes of paper, card, cans, glass and plastic bottles was recycled compared to 1,000 tonnes the previous year.   Much of this increase resulted from a big expansion in the provision of Orange banks on local estates. Banks were installed at 408 new sites, bringing the total number up to 937.

The expansion in Orange banks on estates meant that the percentage of high rise properties with "convenient" recycling facilities, according to Government performance measures, rose ten per cent to 84 per cent. Overall, the total number of Wandsworth households with "convenient" recycling facilities rose to 95 per cent.

There is now one recycling bank for every 80 residents across Wandsworth as a whole. This ratio comfortably beats the Mayor of London's target for boroughs of one bank for every 500 residents.

A record 101 tonnes of Christmas trees were collected for composting in January - a 31 per cent increase on January 2005.
 

And the rising trend looks set to continue with a number of new recycling initiatives in the pipeline.   Next month the Orange sack service will be extended to four local housing estates as part of a £70,000 pilot scheme.  More than 2,000 households will begin receiving a regular delivery of orange sacks, which can be filled with paper, card, glass, cans and plastic bottles, and then put outside the flat on the same day each week where they will be collected by estate cleaning staff.  If the trial is a success, plans will be drawn up to extend the service to a further 24,000 homes.

And more than 15,000 residents in privately owned blocks will soon receive a new reusable sack which can be used to store recycled waste.   The specially designed bags are more robust than the normal Orange sacks and are being delivered to apartment blocks which have an Orange recycling bank in the grounds. They are designed to overcome the problems of limited storage space in flats. Once the bag is full, residents can take it to the bank and dispose of its contents.  The council hopes the new service could help boost the amount of waste recycled from flats in privately-owned blocks by as much as a fifth.

Executive member for environment and leisure Cllr Malcolm Grimston said: "I would like to thank local residents and congratulate them for doing so much to make recycling in Wandsworth such a success.

"This success has been achieved by a very productive partnership that has seen the town hall make recycling so simple, easy and convenient for local people.

"In the coming weeks we will be launching two exciting new schemes that we hope will push up recycling levels even higher. We are keen to build on the success of the past 12 months and will continue to explore new and innovative ways of achieving this."

June 15, 2006