Waste Recycling

About this Item
Speakers - Torbay Mr Richard
Business - Private Members Statements, PRIV

WASTE RECYCLING
Page: 74

Mr RICHARD TORBAY (Northern Tablelands—Speaker) [5.50 p.m.]: One of the intractable problems facing communities today is recycling the huge amount of rubbish we generate. Councils are under pressure through the State's Waste Avoidance Resource Recovery Strategy 2007 to reduce the amount of municipal and commercial and industrial waste going to landfill by 66 per cent and 63 per cent respectively by 2014. On the positive side, there is a lot of evidence that householders are improving their recycling practices. In Armidale the amount of domestic recyclables collected has been rising at about 10 per cent a year. However, until recently it was not the same story with waste from Armidale's industrial, demolition and construction sites. To encourage business to pre-sort their waste, Armidale Dumaresq Council imposed a cost of $162.50 a tonne for unsorted waste. This will increase to $180 a tonne in the near future. The charge for disposal of waste that has been sorted is less than half that amount.

The measure encourages on-site recycling and reduces materials going to landfill. It has also helped Armidale to cap the volume of waste going to landfill at approximately 15,000 tonnes per annum, despite population growth and unprecedented construction activity over the past few years. Reducing landfill disposal rates even further continues to be a challenge, and it is being greatly assisted by an innovative, unique and entrepreneurial business relationship. This week I visited the Material Recycling Facility at the Armidale Waste Transfer Station—the only one of its kind in regional New South Wales. The Material Recycling Facility, run by Jeff and Annette Ridley, is an offshoot of their successful industrial skip bin business. Their company has leased land from Armidale Dumaresq Council at the transfer station for the past three years and initially used it to recycle the contents of their own skips from building and industrial sites in the city. They have four trucks and 280 skips, which generate a considerable volume of waste. Their waste diversion rate from landfill is currently around 66 per cent and is expected to improve.

As their techniques and equipment for separating metal, paper, glass, plastic and other materials improved they entered a new arrangement with Armidale Dumaresq Council, which is undergoing a three-month trial. Now all trucks arriving at the transfer station with loads of suitable commercial waste are diverted to the Material Recycling Facility. The recycling activity has been stepped up and 12 people are employed to sort the waste that formerly went straight to landfill. The financial charge for trucks with unsorted material remains at the penalty rate and the Ridleys receive a share of that fee to finance their activities. The outcome benefits both parties, Armidale Dumaresq Council, which is under pressure to limit the volume of waste to landfill, and the company, which can expand and extend its activities that include developing purpose-built equipment. It is the only partnership of its type known to exist in regional New South Wales, and it is delivering excellent results halfway through the trial period.

Speaking with the Ridleys and with Mike Porter and Dr James Turnell from Armidale Dumaresq Council, I found that the key to the success of the partnership has been goodwill on both sides, excitement about the opportunity to develop innovative waste management processes and a commitment to high industry standards. Compared to many similar operations, it is low cost. Other councils have spent millions of dollars on expensive plant and equipment that return nothing like the steady results emerging from this business relationship in Armidale. It is a model well worth exploring. Plans are now in the pipeline for Armidale to initiate a weekly collection of food waste with other green waste from households to convert into compost using an inexpensive process currently being promoted by the Department of the Environment, Climate Change and Water.

Armidale Dumaresq Council already converts green waste into mulch, which it sells back to the community. The council has been a leader in environmental practices for many years. Its effluent reuse farm recycles the city's sewage to irrigate and fertilise 200 hectares of land that now produces lucerne hay, cattle and timber. It saves the council money in load based licensing fees by removing more than 4,000 kilograms of phosphorus that would normally be discharged into the local river catchment. As an operation it breaks even, but it is the environmental benefits that are of paramount importance and the reason why Armidale won a major award for engineering excellence not long ago. The council's environmental initiatives, plus the successful collaboration with Ridley's Material Recycling Facility, focus on delivering good environmental outcomes, sound business practice and implementing a sustainable local solution to a problem affecting communities across the nation.