Cave dwellers moving on

In the early days of the hunter-gatherer, life was simple; ash from fires, bones and animal waste were left on the ground to enrich the soil, and broken tools or pottery were left behind when nomads moved on. When the hunter-gatherer became a farmer, everything that could be was repaired and reused, and as populations were small and spread out, waste was easy to deal with.

As time progressed, people began to live in communities. In 3000 BC, in Knossos, the capital of Crete, landfill sites were in use; waste was placed in large pits and layered with earth. One thousand years later, in Europe, bronze was recovered from waste, and reused, and composting was practised in China. By 500 BC, the government in Athens had opened the first municipal landfill site one mile outside the city. Forms of reuse and recycling were common throughout the world, as people fed vegetable waste to animals and used manure and green waste as fertiliser.

People began to produce and consume more, and although materials were reused and recycled, as an economic measure, the problem of what to do with rubbish increased.

In 13^th century Britain, waste was burned on open fires in houses, or thrown out into the streets. Trades grouped together in towns adding to the problem. In London, for example, the fishmongers had their stalls in Fish Street Hill, poultry vendors in Poultry Street, and bakers in Bread Street; the butchers were in Stinking Lane and the streets smelled accordingly! Rubbish and sewage were thrown out, pigsties were built outside people’s doors and rotting food blocked the gutters.

In 1297, a law was passed requiring householders to keep the front of their houses clear, but people didn’t take much notice of it. More orders and proclamations followed, and were also ignored. Disease and vermin were a great danger, and led to the worst outbreak of plague, the Black Death in 1348/9, which killed two thirds of the inhabitants of London.

From the mid 14^th Century, men were employed as rakers, to cart the filth away to pits outside the city gates or to the river to be taken away by boats. In 1408 Henry IV ruled that household rubbish should be kept inside until the rakers took it, and that forfeits should be paid if it were not removed.

By the 18^th century things had not improved. The Industrial Revolution began and goods were being produced cheaply, consumption increased and people moved to the towns. The traditional country methods of disposal, such as feeding waste to the pigs or throwing it into pits round the farmhouse were not possible in the towns, where the streets were full of piles of filth and garbage. Scavengers were a common sight.

"Scavenger in an 18th century street" by Simon Chadwick

Many people lived by selling what they could find – bits of wood, coal, rags, bones and dogs’ dung which was valuable as it was used by tanners for purifying leather. ‘Toshers’ worked in the sewers, a dangerous and smelly way to make a living, but lucrative as they found coins, bits of metal, ropes and bones and sometimes jewellery. ‘Mud-larks’ scavenged on the river banks, and made a very poor living.

Over three and a half million tons of coal was burned in London in a year, and the dust produced provided a living for the dustmen. They walked down the streets in hooded caps with flaps at the back, leading a horse and cart and crying ‘Dust o-yeh!’ They filled their buckets from people’s dustbins, emptied them into the cart and then took it to the dust-yard. Here, pigs and chickens rooted about for bits of food, and men, women and children worked on the heaps of rubbish, sieving the brieze (coarse cinders taken to be used in the brickyards) from the soil (sold as manure). Any old boots, kettles, rags or other valuable items were sold, making rich men of dust contractors like "The Golden Dustman", Nicodemas Boffin, in Dickens’ "Our Mutual Friend". The amount of reclamation and recycling depended then as now on economic incentive.

Rag-and-bottle shops sold the items scavengers picked up, and were greasy, dusty smelly shops, often painted bright colours so the old simple scavengers could find them easily; the proprietors were often quite well off.

In the minutes of the Common Council of Southampton, 30 September 1769, it was noted that town scavengers were appointed "to keep the streets clean and to send proper servants and carriages for so doing two days in every week on Fryday and Saturday". In 1753 Messrs Warwick and Minshaw of Southampton undertook to collect the waste and dung, paying a yearly rate of ten guineas plus a couple of capons; this income was paid to the Mayor towards the expenses of his office. In spite of this, there were often complaints about dung heaps in the city. In August 1770, the Southampton Commissioners appointed William Bissington scavenger for the city. He rented the town waste at £5 per annum, and every householder paid scavage money. It was an offence to "throw, cast or lay any ashes, dust, dirt, dung, soil, filth or rubbish, or the refuse of any garden stuff, or any blood, offal, or carrion or any other noisome or offensive matter or thing whatsoever", with a fine of five shillings for a first offence (Minute Book of the Pavement Commissioners of Southampton, 1770-89). The streets were swept twice a week, and the deposits left in heaps in the Marsh to be removed when dry, used as fertiliser, or placed on the Hoy at Water Gate from where it would be "shot immediately into the vessel, without any further Expense of Cartage", and shipped away.

During the first half of the 19^th century, there was no organised means of dealing with the waste from households. The 1848 Public Health Act began the process of waste regulation. The solution was to remove it from the dwellings and store it in "midden heaps" next to them. These were large holes, and when full, the waste and sewage was dug out and removed by a horse and cart for disposal. This was a horrible and heavy job, but labour was cheap.

A cholera outbreak in London claimed many lives and led to The Public Health Act of 1875. This was quite a step forward, as it charged local authorities with the duty to arrange the removal and disposal of waste.

In 1874, the first energy from waste "destructor" was designed and built in Nottingham. It burned mixed waste and produced steam to generate electricity. 250 were built over the next 30 years.

Work started, in 1875, on the building of a pumping station for sewage in Garnier Road, Winchester. This was opened by Sir James Emmen, and extended in 1904 and 1930. Household refuse was used as fuel to produce steam which pumped Winchester’s sewage three quarters of a mile to St Catherine’s Hill for processing. Dustcarts delivered refuse throughout the day, and boilers were stoked every two hours, day and night. Each week 160 tonnes of material was burned. In 1950, two steam engines were installed and these powered rotary pumps which discharged one million gallons of sewage every 24 hours. Steam engines were superceded by electric motors or diesel engines, and the pumping station closed when the new Otterbourne incinerator was built in 1973.

In 1885, Fryers Destructor was built at Corporation Wharf, Chapel, Southampton, also burning refuse to produce steam to pump sewage, and integrating the two processes.

To comply with the Public Health Act 1875, refuse was collected regularly, to provide a routine for householders and also to reduce infestations of the housefly; the life cycle of the pest, from egg laying to the emergence of the adult insect was taken into account. This had a huge impact on death rates, which fell from 33 per 1000 population in 1870, to 13 per 1000 population in 1930. In 1926 Birmingham City Council proposed a national waste reduction campaign.

Most refuse collection was by horse and cart, but in 1922 the first petrol-engined vehicle was used. Southampton did not use motorised vehicles for refuse collection until 1964.

Kitty leaving Shirley Depot for the last time in 1967, with Mr Tony Wiseman

Meanwhile, types of waste produced were changing. Until the early 20^th Century, packaging was minimal, and very little was thrown away. The packaging revolution grew slowly to begin with, and the throwaway culture began with the marketing aim of making the customer constantly come back for more. It began with the disposable crown-shaped bottle top, followed by the throwaway razor blade. In 1904 New York tea importer, Thomas Sullivan invented the tea bag; this was really to save money on tin tea boxes, but the bags became popular. This was followed by the disposable paper cup, advertised with the slogan "Influenza sits on the brim of the Common Drinking Cup", and the disposable paper handkerchief. Aluminium foil was used for milk-bottle tops in Sweden in 1914, but not elsewhere until after the Second World War.

The Public Health Act of 1936 was passed and Authorities were given the power to prosecute people for dumping and scavenging, and also set out rules for landfill site management, though these were mainly ignored. The standard British galvanised metal dustbin was developed. In the 1930s, a large proportion of people’s waste was dust from fires. People were encouraged to burn their waste, with the slogan "Burn your refuse – reduce your rates" which was painted on the sides of refuse vehicles throughout Britain. Paper and coal were burned on home fires and there were only small amounts of textiles, glass and metals, because most of these went into reclamation schemes or were collected by rag and bone men.

Tuesday 29 June 1937 saw the official opening of the Refuse Disposal Plant at Corporation Wharf, Chapel, Southampton. Items such as tins and other magnetic material were extracted and baled, bottles and other valuables were hand picked. 36.39% of the refuse was ashes and dust, so measures had to be taken to prevent it from being blown about the site, less of a problem nowadays, as modern waste contains a very small proportion of dust and ashes. The dust was screened and barged out to sea. Non salvageable material and the "more offensive classes of trades refuse and garbage with a high moisture content", were conveyed to furnaces and incinerated. (County Borough of Southampton Works Committee Souvenir of the Official Opening of the Refuse Disposal Plant Corporation Wharf, Chapel, Southampton.) This disposal plant closed in the early 1970s when Marchwood Incinerator opened. Four other incinerators were in use in Hampshire in the 1970s and 80s, at Chineham, Otterbourne, Havant and Portsmouth.

During the wars there was a great deal of reclamation and recycling, promoted by a national salvage publicity campaign to help "the War Effort". However, after the Second World War, huge refuse tips grew up round the big cities, and these burned continuously causing problems of pollution and risk to health.

In the post-war years, landfill dominated waste disposal but nobody thought much about the environmental impact of water pollution and methane gas. The consumer society began to evolve, and production and consumption increased, creating new wastes and new problems; products were designed to be thrown away and packaging increased. The use of aluminium cans grew. In the 1930s polythene plastics began to be manufactured from chemicals produced from petroleum (cellophane from plant cellulose, had been produced in small quantities since 1908). Plastic production grew slowly for a while, and then from the 1950s, very quickly. To meet consumer demand, there was an increase in manufacturing, industry, mining and quarrying, agriculture and food processing, all producing waste.

In 1956, the Clean Air Act was passed. There were fewer open fires as these were replaced by central heating, fueled by oil, gas or electricity. Household waste changed from being mostly ash, dust and cinders from fires to other wastes like food and paper, which would previously have been burned.

In the 1960s the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution was set up. The 1970s saw increased clean air legislation and health and safety awareness, and an increase in concerns about use of energy and depletion of resources. The public at last began to become aware of the environment, and the emphasis changed from protecting public health to include environmental protection. Public outcry over some dumped drums of cyanide led to legislation to control hazardous waste. The Control of Pollution Act, in 1974 led to the creation of Waste Collection Authorities and introduced the licensing of waste disposal facilities.

In 1973 the production of the plastic bottle was perfected. Although plastic packaging reduced food waste, increasing amounts of non-biodegradable plastic has become a problem. Throwaway nappy pads first appeared in Sweden soon after the Second World War, but they weren’t very successful until Pampers were launched in 1966. In the 1970s "throwaway" became fashionable, with disposable pants, shirts and furniture becoming popular. Disposable cameras, lighters and watches were common in the 1980s. Plastic refuse sacs were introduced in Southampton in 1981. During this decade public concern over waste disposal increased.

In spite of increased awareness and legislation to tackle the waste problem, the 1990s saw a surge in convenience food and ready meals with all the packaging they require. White goods such as fridges and cookers are being thrown away in ever increasing numbers, and electronic goods are a relatively new waste. Already millions of televisions, videos, home computers, telephones and microwaves are being landfilled every year. The age of electronic communication is beginning to reduce the amount of paper produced by businesses, but there is still a culture of dependence on the printed word. The average household in Hampshire throws away 1.3 tonnes of waste each year.

In 1990, a White Paper on the Environment set out a waste strategy including waste minimisation and recycling as priorities, and setting a target of 25% recycling by the year 2000. The Environmental Protection Act of 1990 brought new regulations and controls, including a requirement for local authorities to contract out household waste disposal operations. This was followed by the Duty of Care, requiring anybody dealing with waste to manage it safely, and legislation requiring large businesses to recover and recycle packaging waste. Landfill Tax was introduced in 1996 to encourage reuse and recycling and promote waste minimisation, and responsibility for regulation of waste management passed from local authorities to a new Environment Agency. In June 2000, the government’s National Waste Strategy set new higher targets for local authority recycling, paved the way for a network of energy recovery incinerators and further discouraged landfilling as a means of waste disposal.

The current infrastructure for waste collection and disposal in Hampshire includes local authority controlled collection vehicles supplying a network of transfer stations from which waste is taken to be landfilled. 78% of Hampshire households are also serviced by a separate collection of recyclable materials, which are taken to one of three Materials Recovery Facilities (MRFs) throughout the county. Here materials are sorted, baled and transported to reprocessing companies to be made into new goods. A network of sites to which householders can bring recyclables is also provided - 26 Household Waste Recycling Centres and many bottle, can and paper banks also feed recyclable material into the MRFs.

The Portsmouth Materials Recovery Facility

Reuse and recycling have been carried out to a greater or lesser extent throughout history, until recently as a necessity for economic reasons. Money and resources could be saved by reuse, and made by recycling. It was labour intensive and mainly carried out by the poor. As the economy developed in the 19^th Century, reuse and recycling became less important and the more prosperous throwaway society saw little need for them. In the second half of the 20^th Century, people slowly became aware of the need to preserve the environment, save energy and conserve resources, and recycling again became important. Composting has always been used by farmers and gardeners as a means of using bio-degradable waste. This is also now carried out on a larger scale at Hampshire’s central composting sites where householders’ garden waste, collected at the HWRCs, is composted. Composting is now seen as an important contribution to waste reduction, also lessening the harmful effects of landfill gas. In cities, such as Southampton, where there are few gardens and home composting is not an option, new technologies such as anaerobic digestion are being considered.

Burning of waste on home fires was practiced extensively until the 1950s. Central heating put an end to such widespread use of domestic fires. Incineration plants, which although in the late 19th century when they first appeared, produced unacceptable levels of dust, ash and smoke, have now been developed and regulated to produce environmentally safer emissions, and play a part in reducing landfill.

Landfilling is the oldest method of waste disposal, and is still used extensively, but although management of sites is becoming more scientific, reducing the damage to the environment, space is a problem, it is becoming more expensive and alternatives are being pursued.

National and local government interest and funding for environmental issues has set the agenda for more sophisticated methods of reclamation and disposal. Public awareness of waste minimisation as an important part of sustainable development is essential as we enter the 21^st century.

References

• History of Waste Waste Watch October 1997
• Refuse Collection Systems Institute of Wastes Management 1997
• Volume One of the Minute Books of the Pavement Commissioners 1770-1789 Transcribed from Document SC AP 1/1 in the Southampton Civic Record Office
• County Borough of Southampton Works Committee Souvenir of the Official Opening of the Refuse Disposal Plant corporation Wharf, Chapel, Southampton 29/6/1937
• Hibbert C, London: The Biography of a City Penguin Books 1988
• Video of The Last Steam Pumps in Winchester, University of Southampton Department of Education 1975