A £3 million kerbside recycling scheme operating in some parts of Angus is likely to be rolled out across the rest of the county.
Areas around Arbroath and Carnoustie have been part of a kerbside recycling collection service. Now, members of Angus Council’s neighbourhood services committee are to meet in Forfar tomorrow to discuss the scheme’s extension.
The costs for rolling out the trial across Angus will be around £2.9m. A report by Alan McKeown, strategic director for communities, will ask councillors to agree to spend the cash on the county-wide scheme.
Collection of garden waste on a four-weekly basis during winter will also be suggested, along with the introduction of “end-of-road” collections for houses accessible by private roads but only where practical.
Angus Council’s recycling rate is currently 40% and approximately 40,000 tonnes of general waste are collected per year.
Landfill tax for active waste sent to landfill is £72 per tonne and will increase to £80 from April 1 next year worth £3.2m in landfill tax.
Mr McKeown’s report says: “We currently service an estimated 2,600 households via private access roads.
“These households have thus far been excluded from recycling services due to the excessive travel times involved in providing collections from these households and the varying conditions of these roads, which are often not suitable for a large refuse collection vehicle to use.
“At present we only provide a recycling collection service to 45,799 households (out of a total of 54,300).
“It is proposed that we increase the geographical coverage of recycling collection services to approximately 53,500 households (leaving only approximately 800 of the most remote households excluded from the service).”
A weekly collection of glass, cans and paper in a 55-litre box will be collected once a fortnight in a much larger 240-litre bin. Garden waste’s fortnightly collection will remain unchanged.
A pre-trial survey was carried out in July last year, followed by one in March to see how residents’ attitudes had changed.
Satisfaction levels have risen slightly, with 89% of respondents rating the service as good, very good or excellent, compared to 87% pre-trial.
Mr McKeown’s break-down of the roll-out costs includes: seven collection vehicles for collection of recyclables (26 tonne vehicles) £976,680, 11 collection vehicles for food waste (7.5 tonne vehicles) £605,000, 48,500 purple 140-litre bins for general waste £921,500 and food bins and caddies (48,500) £215,825,
Allowances totalling £2.7m for the kerbside recycling roll-out have been included in the 2012/2017 financial plan for the next two years.
This includes £1.5m to buy new vehicles.