Lothian and Borders Area Waste Plan

The National Waste Strategy: Scotland (NWSS) establishes key principles, which need to be taken into account in establishing a sustainable future for waste management. A number of these have influenced the development of the Lothian and Borders Area Waste Plan. These are:

How these principles will affect the development of waste management systems and methods in Lothian and Borders is described below.

The Waste Hierarchy provides a framework within which the most desirable waste management options are set out. Within Lothian and Borders, in common with the majority of Scotland, existing waste management practices are towards the bottom of the hierarchy. The objective of sustainable waste management is to move waste practices up this hierarchy with more waste prevented at source and thereafter increase the percentage of waste that can be minimised, reused, recycled and recovered. Ultimately the amount of waste being disposed of to landfill should continue to reduce.

Waste Prevention
At the top of the waste hierarchy, and central to the principle of sustainable development is the minimisation of waste through prevention. Waste Prevention encompasses three activities that reduce both the quantity and the hazardous character of the waste:

a) Strict avoidance – the complete prevention of waste generation by virtual elimination of hazardous substances or by reducing material of energy intensity in production, consumption and distribution.

b) Reduction at Source – minimising use of toxic material or energy consumption.

c) Product Reuse – the multiple use of a product in its original form, for its original purpose or for an alternative, with or without reconditioning.

Therefore, waste prevention forms a key element of the National Waste Strategy: Scotland and will be particularly pertinent to the Lothian and Borders Area Waste Plan if growth in waste arisings is to be reduced because some of the projected economic and population growth rates are amongst the highest in Scotland. It is, however, recognised that there is already a lot of excellent work being carried out to reduce the amount of waste that is produced at source. This work must be further developed and should reinforce that individual action at the local level can make a difference.

Waste prevention initiatives must address two distinct waste steams:

Consumers within both of these waste streams can act practically to prevent waste when purchasing and disposing of products. For instance, consumers can decide to favour products with the less packaging or choose not to buy disposable products. Where possible, when the product is replaced, consumers should endeavour to pass the product on to someone else to utilise.

Central government recognised the role of Local Authorities in waste prevention through the Waste-Minimisation Act 1998 that establishes powers for councils to take steps to minimise the generation of household, commercial or industrial waste. Councils are already active in promotion and education of waste prevention in the area, such as providing home composters to local residents and distributing waste prevention and recycling leaflets to householders. However, consultations indicate that awareness of how householders can prevent or minimise their waste is still relatively low. The Lothian and Borders Waste Strategy Area Group will aim to influence the reduction the current growth in Municipal Solid Waste arisings (see Table 7) and ultimately seek to stabilise growth by 2020. This will be monitored via indicator 1 (Table 19) as set out in section 5.5.2.

An example highlighting the potential impact of waste minimisation for MSW Growth Projections :

If annual growth in municipal solid waste arising in each local authority area can be reduced from the current average of 2.62% to 1.62% by 2010, 0.82% by 2013 and stabilised by 2020, through increased education and awareness and the implementation of waste minimisation, the projections for waste arisings and BMW diversion requirements over the next 18 years will be significantly different.

The graph below highlights the impact of this stabilisation model on the projected growth in MSW arisings (set out in Table 7, Section 2.2.1).

The graph over highlights the impact of the stabilisation of waste growth model on the estimated diversion of BMW to meet the landfill directive (as set out in Table 8, Section 2.2.1)

It must be recognised that to realise any waste minimisation targets a co-ordinated effort by government, industry and the public is fundamental and further regulatory and economic instruments, increased education and awareness, and other measures will be needed to increase producer responsibility and waste reduction.

Reuse and Refurbishment
Traditional reuse and refurbishment activity has declined in recent years as the cost of replacing consumer durables has fallen in relation to the cost of repair. However, as well as removing items from the waste stream, reuse and refurbishment are linked to job creation and economic improvement, and there remain opportunities for stimulating activity at a local level. Reuse and refurbishment schemes also have opportunities to support community initiatives for low-income families and socially disadvantaged groups.

There is already considerable activity in Lothian and Borders by such groups as Edinburgh Furniture Initiative, Bethany Christian Trust, East Lothian Voluntary Organisation Network (ELVON), St.Vincent de Paul in Midlothian and Homeaid in West Lothian. The reuse and refurbishment of white goods is currently under pressure due to the enforcement of the Regulation (EC) No 2037/2000 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 29 June 2000 on substances that deplete the ozone layer, but increased partnership working with community initiatives to minimise the number of white goods for disposal has the potential to assist the current storage and reprocessing issues for Local Authorities. The Area Waste Plan also recognises the potential impact that increasing levels of Health and Safety related legislation are having on refurbishment activities. The Waste Strategy Area Group will seek to support local groups in updating them on changing legislative requirements wherever possible.

Recycling and Composting
Recycling is the separation of a material for processing, followed by preparation and sale onto a market replacing an existing virgin material. As such, there are often numerous environmental benefits, such as reduced air emissions, reduced impacts of extraction, energy savings, lower disposal impacts and more efficient use of raw materials. Other benefits also exist, such as encouraging producers to take responsibility for their wastes, and economic benefits, such as improved competitiveness or greater employment opportunities.

Composting is the aerobic decomposition of organic material to produce a stable material containing organic matter and plant nutrients. Applying this material to land, including nutrient addition, improved soil structure and improved water retention provides additional benefits.

The current rates for household waste recycling and composting in the Lothian and Borders ranges from 4 to 15% in each local authority area in 2001/2002. This is carried out predominantly through bring recycling sites with limited trial areas for kerbside collections. The BPEO for the Lothian and Borders will seek to meet all Landfill Directive requirements by maximising recycling and composting throughout the area. This will require a high level of participation of householders and businesses that can only be achieved through education and awareness, and making recycling just as easy as disposal.

Misc. includes: Gas Cylinders, Electrics, Audio Equipment, Fridges, White Goods, Yellow Pages, Books, Batteries and Oil.

Total MSW Recycling in the Lothian and Borders for 2001/2002 is 25 238 tonnes, this equates to 5.2% of total MSW arisings. Table 4 in Section 1.5.1 details the current infrastructure throughout the area to achieve this.

Due to the diverse nature of the area and range of housing types, there will be no one suitable way to recover materials from households whilst keeping environmental impacts of transport, etc., to a minimum. The Waste Strategy Area Group will, therefore, focus their efforts on:

The range of methods include: kerbside containers, kerbside boxes, sacks, survival sacks, on-street containerisation, bring sites, Civic Amenity Sites, etc.

Commercial recycling services have the potential to maximise the overall benefits and feasibility of household recycling services, and will be integrated wherever possible. Examples of recycling schemes that can enhance household recycling include:

Composting of wastes other than garden wastes will have to be in line with any regulatory requirements set out by DEFRA under the Composting of Animal By Products and Catering Wastes Guidance.

Other Recovery
Other recovery involves recovering part of the energy value from waste, either by burning or thermally treating the waste directly (e.g. incineration), or by burning a fuel produced by the waste (e.g. Refuse Derived Fuel or landfill gas). The energy conversion efficiency of the plant will depend on the specific design, e.g. recovery of energy through combined heat and power will recover more energy than just generating electricity from waste.

Mass burn incineration plants have a poor reputation in the UK and have generally not included energy recovery, which has led to strong public aversion to such plants and a strong NIMBY (Not In My Back Yard) factor. They also tend to need expensive pollution control equipment to meet modern air emission standards and, if largescale plants are built as the only or main technology for waste treatment, may result in a mixed-waste-treatment system that lacks flexibility to include other type of waste recovery and can be contrary to the objectives of waste minimisation. Refer to SEPA’s “Guidelines and Approach to Thermal Treatment and Energy from Waste” available on the www.sepa.org/nws.

Waste Collection and Disposal

Collection
Councils have a duty to collect waste from households and from commercial premises that request a service. Traditionally household waste collections have been undertaken weekly (twice weekly for tenement properties that do not have access to on-street containerisation). This may change with multi-receptacle collection systems such as that trialled by West Lothian, East Lothian and City of Edinburgh Councils and proposed for the Midlothian area. This will require significant levels of education and awareness to help facilitate the process of change and adequate storage for the containers.

The collection of waste also has associated environmental impacts from transport. Additional collections will require additional vehicles and fuel consumption, and in already congested roads alternatives must be investigated, e.g. sorting waste on collection, alternate weekly collections for waste and recycling, alternative transport methods. A national feasibility study on more sustainable methods of transporting wastes from collection to treatment and disposal, the results of which will inform the development of future waste-collection systems at the local level is being undertaken. Cleaner fuel options are also available and should be considered in reducing the environmental impact on unavoidable transport requirements. Where practicable, rail transport should be chosen for bulk movement of waste where it can be used at reasonable cost.

Action 1
Investigate and implement where practicable the use of cleaner fuels when collecting and transporting waste materials.

Disposal
Mass burn combustion of mixed wastes without energy recovery is the least desirable option within the Waste Hierarchy, but this, however, is not an option that is being considered for the sustainable management of future waste arisings. Within the context of the Area Waste Plan, therefore, landfill is regarded as the least desirable overall option in the Waste Hierarchy, due to its potential to pollute and poor use of natural resources. However, there will always be a need to landfill residual materials that have little or no further calorific value worth recovering.

Whilst it is important to recognise that for some wastes particularly in remote areas, landfill may have a significant role to play in managing wastes locally. Overall this will not be the case for the Lothian and Borders, where the aim is to minimise the amount of waste being landfilled.

The National Waste Strategy: Scotland requires the identification of a 5–10 year forward capacity of landfill, with planning permission for active (non-hazardous) and inert sites. With around a third of the current landfill facilities closing within the next 2 years forward capacity for all wastes needs to be identified in the Lothian and Borders.

Action 2
Carry out an assessment of current and likely future landfill capacity requirements for all wastes.

This concept relates to disposing of waste as near as possible to the point at which it arises. Most of waste originating in Lothian and Borders is managed within the area, with the current exception of MSW from West Lothian and wastes requiring specialist treatment, such as hazardous wastes, and wastes being sent for recycling e.g. paper waste is often transported as far as the south of England. Although this is likely to continue to be the case, as greater quantities of material for recycling are collected, then there may be more opportunities for the development of more local markets and reprocessing facilities.

The Best Practicable Environmental Option is the outcome of a systematic and consultative decision-making procedure, which emphasises the protection, and conservation of the environment across land, air and water. The procedure establishes, for a given set of objectives, the option that provides the most benefits or the least damage to the environment as a whole using Life-Cycle-Assessment modelling, at acceptable cost, in the long term as well as in the short term. The application of BPEO within the National Waste Strategy framework has included the consideration of options against social, economic and environmental criteria. The Lothian and Borders Area Waste Plan describes the BPEO for Municipal Solid Wastes and sets out the process by which the BPEO will be determined and implemented for all other wastes.