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| No more than the sorting office When the postman travels from post-box to post-box collecting the mail, he empties the letters into a sack. They are all mixed up. Some of the letters may be for the lady down the road, others may destined for the furthest corners of the earth. It doesn’t matter where the letters are to go, they all get deposited in the post box and they all get mixed up in the sack. No-one expects the postman to sort out the letters on the side of the road. Instead he or she takes them to the sorting office where they are separated out and sent to their various destinations. A Materials Recovery Facility (MRF) is a bit like a sorting office. Instead of letters there are plastic bottles, newspapers and drinks cans collected from households. The materials are collected all mixed up – because, like the letters, it is by far the most effective way to do it – and, like the letters, the materials need to be sorted into their various factions and sent on their way. In the case of the MRF, not to the lady down the road, but to a materials reprocessor, who like the recipient of a letter may be in East Hampshire or may be in Holland. As in the sorting office, nobody opens or interferes with the letters, so in the MRF nothing is done to the materials other than to sort them into types and grades so that the materials can be used in the production of new products, hence completing the circle known as "recycling". Despite this simple function, the MRF is a key item in a waste management system if high levels of recycling are to be achieved. Only by the participation of the householder in dividing the useable materials from the unuseable and these two streams each being collected separately, can the quality of recovered materials be obtained that can be used in new products. Without being able to guarantee certain levels of purity, manufacturers will not take the risk of using recovered materials in their products. If the recovered materials are not used, then there is no point in recovering them and everything may as well be put into one sack and taken to the landfill. Project Integra has spent the last five years trying to move away from that scenario. The MRF is also the key to the future of recycling in Hampshire. At present, facilities are being built which will deal with the household waste generated in the county and provide a recycling level of 25%. In order to reach this level, however, a further MRF is required to replace the ageing ones in Otterbourne and Farnborough and to give additional capacity.A recycling level of 25% is excellent for the UK, but the target is to reach 40%. This target will only be achieved by collecting more useable materials from the householder and designing the sorting facilities within the MRFs to handle the additional materials. It is inevitable that the useable materials must continue to be collected from the householder mixed together, if collection costs are to be kept low. Hence the MRFs will be required to continue their role of sorting the materials and sending them to the reprocessors. The role of Project Integra – Project Integra is the partnership between all the local authorities in Hampshire, and Hampshire Waste Services Ltd. Our objective is to manage, recover and dispose of household waste in the most environmentally sustainable way possible. What is Hampshire Waste Services currently providing? – We have invested heavily in new MRFs to process and sort the material collected by the householders to be recycled. The latest has been built in Portsmouth and was opened by Micheal Meacher, the Minister for the Environment in July 1998. Since opening, it has played a significant part in the Project Integra strategy, processing some 42,000 tonnes of material a year, with no inconvenience to its neighbours. To increase recycling further we have also developed a number of composting facilities, which receive green waste from the Household Waste Recycling Centres (civic amenity sites) to produce Pro-Grow, Hampshire’s organic soil conditioner. Through the Household Waste Recycling Centres, MRFs and Composting sites, Hampshire Waste has put waste reduction and recycling at the top of its list. And as part of its commitment, it has worked with the County and Local Authorities to campaign for the reduction and reuse of the waste that is generated in Hampshire.The Facts - County wide, Hampshire is achieving about 20% recycling, the rest is currently landfilled. That amounts to some 650,000 tonnes every year being put into the ground. Our recycling target for the year 2000 is 25% and 40% in the long term. The Function of the MRF - Fundamental to the success of recycling, and to take Hampshire up to 25% and beyond, is to sort and process the materials that can be reused to produce a product that the market place wants and will actually use to produce new products. For example newspapers and magazines to make more newspapers, aluminium drink cans to make more drink cans and so on. To achieve this we need MRFs that will sort and process the materials they receive to enhance their quality and value. At our MRFs in Hampshire the material goes through a mix of mechanical processes, magnets and manual operation to achieve a saleable product at the end. This mix allows the MRF to adapt and handle the different types of materials they receive throughout its life. The Role of the Householder - A key part of the process is a kerbside collection scheme which allows the householder to put their cans, plastic bottles, paper and card out for recycling at the kerbside. This again improves the quality and value of the material received at the MRFs. These kerbside collection schemes which are already in operation across most of Hampshire are a very simple but effective means of collecting materials wanted for recycling by the same people that collect the normal "black bag" rubbish. By making it easy for the householder to participate, the amount received is greatly increased. And by keeping it simply at the kerbside, it is more cost effective and easy to implement by the District Councils. Of course the success of recycling in Hampshire will only be achieved with the participation of all the householders to sort their waste, not just once, but every week.21 June 1999 For further information please contact Jeanette Camilleri at Hampshire Waste Services on 01962 764063. |
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