Yorkshire Water - Bricking it!

YORKSHIRE WATER are "bricking it!" That's official!

It's not because they are scared of local anti-pong campaigners. No, it's for an altogether different reason!

Yorkshire Water are making building bricks from their incinerated sewage. The building bricks and blocks are made by combining ash from incinerated sewage with vegetable oil.

Jon Brigg, Innovation Development Manager at Yorkshire Water said:

"We are always looking for ways in which we can make the best use of our waste to have a positive impact on our environment and this project is a great way to reuse incinerated sludge ash which has traditionally been sent to landfill. With new building regulations coming into force in the next few years home builders will need to reduce the embedded carbon cost of all new homes - the bricks and blocks will provide a perfect alternative to traditional house bricks."

The product is currently being tested by the company in Leeds and aims to provide an alternative to traditional cement, which is responsible for around five per cent of global carbon dioxide emissions.

Hmm... I'm sure that local anti-smell campaigners will have something witty to say about this!?

Source: Yorkshire Water

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Waste Management - Procurement event

EAST RIDING and Hull City Councils are jointly holding a one-day event for waste management companies.

The event on Thursday, 9 June at The Guildhall, Hull, will be for local, regional, national and international companies interested in tendering for the councils’ future waste contracts.

The event will also enable the councils to identify potential suppliers and develop general market knowledge. It will also allow potential service providers to gain knowledge of the councils’ requirements.

There will be presentations from both councils about their joint sustainable waste management strategy, followed by an open question and answer session. Individual meetings will be held with interested companies.

The joint strategy is based on both councils working together to attain better value for money by sharing waste facilities.

Issued by Gillian Pattison, East Riding of Yorkshire Council
Tel: 01482 391450
Email: Gillian.Pattison@eastriding.gov.uk

Image: eRiding.net

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Flytipping costs us at least £68 per hour!

TO CLEAR AWAY FLY TIPPED RUBBISH - illegally dumped waste - costs the council £68 per hour! And to dispose of such waste correctly at a landfill site can cost a further £56 per tonne - and if asbestos is included in the waste this can rise to £1,500 per tonne to be collected and disposed off!

In the period between April 2006 to February 2011 the East Riding Council dealt with 4,717 reports of fly-tipping on its land and investigated each incident. These investigations - which also incur costs to the Council - led to 59 successful prosecutions, 11 formal cautions and the issue of 232 formal warning letters.

These figures have been released by the East Riding Council following a Freedom of Information request.

The Environment Agency has said that on a national basis, dealing with the problem of fly tipping can cost £100-£150 million every year. This cost falls on taxpayers and private landowners. Fly-tipping adversely affects local environments, threatening the health of rivers and recreation areas and even reducing property prices in the area.

You can report fly tipping to the Council online at the East Riding Council website.

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New Brown Bin Service comes to Holderness

THE ROLL OUT of the new Brown Bin service, which will allow food waste and cardboard to be put into the Brown Bins, has started in Holderness.

By the end of July up to 150,000 households across the East Riding will be putting food waste and cardboard into the brown bin, so that it can be sent for composting.

Once households have received a brown caddy and information pack, food waste, including plate scraps and bones, and cardboard can be put into the brown bin.

Further details of the new service are available on the council’s recycling website, www.target45plus.org.uk - New kitchen, cardboard and garden waste collection.

Food Waste and Cardboard Information Leaflet

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New food waste and cardboard Brown Bin collections to start "soon"

CHANGES TO BROWN BIN COLLECTION SERVICES first announced last June, are due to be implemented by the East Riding Council in the next few weeks following a considerable delay.

Brown bins will soon be used for food and kitchen waste and cardboard as well as garden waste. The food waste will include leftover meats, fish and bones. The collection of this waste is now possible because of a new system of composting which heats it to remove the risk of health hazards. Following the change, all types of cardboard will be put in the brown bins. After first being stripped of wrapping, cellophane and sticky tape, cardboard would need to be flattened before being placed loose in the brown bin.

NOTE: Residents are asked to wait until they receive official information from the Council before they start adding any new items to any bins.

Residents will soon be receiving information packs including a calendar stating collection days. All households will recieve a kitchen caddy and biodegradable liners for their food waste which they can use to transport the food waste to the big brown bin.

The changes to the Brown bin collection service was piloted in Hessle last year and the roll-out to other areas was due to start in the Hedon and Withernsea areas first in September 2010. However, what a council spokesperson described as "logistical problems" resulted in the implementation being delayed.

In the first full 12 months after the roll-out, council officers are predicting that 7,100 tonnes of food waste and 2,100 of cardboard will be collected from the brown bins and sent for composting. A total of 9,300 tonnes will be composted instead of being sent to landfill.

Keep an eye on Target45plus News Page for the latest information. Image. eRiding.net

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Wheelie Good News - East Riding bin collectors win national recognition

BIN COLLECTIONS in the East Riding have been voted the best in the country.

The council’s kerbside collections of the blue, brown and green bins have just been awarded Best Overall Performer in England: Refuse Collection by the Association for Public Service Excellence (APSE). APSE is a national benchmarking group that promotes excellence in public services among over 300 councils.

The winners received their awards at an Awards Ceremony in Blackpool from actress and Coronation Street star Shobna Gulati.

Councillor Stephen Parnaby, leader of the council, said: “Every week our collection teams empty up to a quarter of a million bins across an area of 1,000 square miles. Winning this award is national recognition for their efforts in delivering highly valued public services." 

Mark Bramah, assistant chief executive of APSE, said “The importance of local councils demonstrating that they are providing high quality and cost effective services is greater now than ever before.” 

The council was considered against several indicators, including cost, quality, the tonnes of domestic waste recycled per household, the percentage of household waste that is composted, and the number of missed collections. The collection teams also came top in the human resources criteria with 97 per cent of staff attaining NVQ Level 2 in Waste Management Operations. The average number of days lost due to sickness was also one of the lowest in the country. 

The council's collection teams are based at Carnaby, Bridlington; Goole, Market Weighton, Hedon and Willerby. 

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East Riding Council Waste Trade

£1.2 MILLION HAS BEEN SPENT over the last 4 years by the East Riding Council on disposing of waste in other local authorities landfill sites reports the Hull Daily Mail.

The newspaper reports that East Riding Council has spent £1.2m on disposing of municipal waste in this way since the Landfill Allowance Trading Scheme - or LATS - began.

Under the LATS scheme the Council has paid to obtain permits to dispose of waste elsewhere in the country. They have been prompted to do this to avoid paying Government fines for going over targets for the amount of waste they are allowed to dispose of at their own landfill sites.

The LATS scheme enables those authorities exceeding their targets to legitimately dispose of their surplus to other Councils that are well within their targets. Disposing of surplus waste in this way is cheaper (approx £14 per tonne) than paying the Government fines (approx £150 per tonne). 

Of course by spending money on obtaining LATS permits rather than paying Government fines does save the Council money, but does not address the underlying problem: More needs to be done to improve recycling rates and reduce the amounts of waste sent to landfill.

The Mail cites an Audit Commission report warning that the UK's landfill sites will be full to capacity in just six years unless current practices change. But Local HOTI campaigners will be alarmed by the Mail article's assertion that the region is particularly dependent on landfill, because it has no incinerator.

Source: Hull Dail Mail

Other information: 

Landfill Allowance Trading Scheme

East Riding Council Recycling

HOTI - Blog Post on Opposing the Incinerator demonstration

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