1. Introduction

1.1 Background

Waste management in Scotland is facing a period of rapid and radical change. Driven by European legislation, the need for improved environmental protection and public expectation, we must find ways of reducing our current dependence on landfill and move towards more sustainable methods of managing waste. We must also seek to reduce the growth in waste arisings, minimise resource use, reduce the hazardous content of waste and find waste-management solutions that do not compromise the future. This is in line with the principle of sustainable development. This will require a fundamental change in our current attitude to waste and an acceptance that each of us has a responsibility to reduce waste and not simply to pass the responsibility on to others.

In order to tackle these issues the National Waste Strategy: Scotland described a process of area waste planning and the formation of WSAGs. The strategy was adopted by the Scottish Executive as the principal mechanism to develop sustainable waste management across Scotland. The North East WSAG was formed in April 2000 and is a partnership of the following organisations:

• Aberdeenshire Council
  

• Aberdeen City Council
  

• Moray Council
  

• Scottish Environment Protection Agency
  

• Scottish Enterprise Grampian
  

• Scottish Enterprise Moray Badenoch and Strathspey

This is the first Area Waste Plan to be prepared for the North East. Dealing primarily at this stage with the management of MSW, the plan sets out a strategy that will meet the Landfill Directive Diversion Targets. While other waste streams are dealt with in less detail, principally because of a lack of quantitative and qualitative information, the AWP establishes a number of actions to enable detailed plans to be formulated.