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10 West Dunbartonshire Council

10.1 Details of pilot scheme

10.1.1 Pilot scheme area

The pilot scheme area was situated in Dumbarton and Clydebank. These areas comprise of 4080 households of mixed property type, ranging from tenements to modern low-rise blocks, properties with and without secure building access and a range of bin store types. There is a mix of private/public ownership.

Annex 4 provides a breakdown of the ACORN classification for the pilot area. The majority of households lie within ACORN Category 5 'Hard Pressed'. Most of these (59% of the total) are ACORN Type 53 'old people, many high-rise flats'.

10.1.2 Existing waste and recyclables collection

Existing waste collection infrastructure can be summarised as follows:

Prior to implementation of the pilot scheme, recycling provision was via local recycling points. A total of 25% of respondents to the SWAG pre-pilot survey said they currently used recycling points. Respondents highlighted the Dalmuir Shopping Centre recycling point as being the most commonly used.

10.1.3 Pilot scheme

The main objective of the scheme is to pilot the provision of doorstep recyclate collection for tenement and mixed multi occupational properties. The Council considered that this service provided an equitable service to all householders in an area regardless of property type. It also removes potential planning problems of adding shared bins.

The pilot scheme can be summarised as follows.

Figure 10-1 West Dunbartonshire's Pilot Scheme

Greenlight Environmental, a community sector company, were contracted to provide the collection service. Two operatives were utilised in the collection process, one to collect mixed recyclate and the other to collect the paper. Mixed recyclates were carried in bulk sacks that were distilled at the collection vehicle. No sorting of recyclates was undertaken at the doorstep or kerbside. Each householder had their own dedicated bin and bag which was returned to their doorstep after emptying. Recyclate material was collected and bulked at Greenlight's warehouse before onward transportation to reprocessors.

10.2 Pilot Scheme Evaluation

10.2.1 Tonnage of material recovered

The pilot scheme commenced operation on the 4th July 2005. For the period up to the 23rd January, data received from the Council shows a total of 157.6 tonnes of recyclate was collected. This is equivalent to a diversion rate of 1.29 kg/hh/week.

A full data set is provided in Annex 7. Results from waste analysis are discussed separately in Section 11.

10.2.2 Results of SWAG public opinion surveys

In West Dumbartonshire 373 people responded to the pre-pilot survey, and 371 to the mid-pilot. Figure 10-2 & Figure 10-3 summarise the key results for the SWAG public opinion surveys. Before the pilot, 92% of respondents stated they had no household recycling scheme. With the pilot in place, 66% reported they knew about it and used it, 23% knew about it but did not use it, and 10% reported they did not have, or did not know about, the pilot recycling scheme.

Figure 10-2 Use of household recycling scheme: pre- and mid-pilot.

Figure 10-3: Use of recycling points: pre- and mid-pilot

The reported use of recycling points reduced from 25% to 15%. The reported use of recycling centres decreased slightly from 18% to 11%. The use of recycling points decreased for newspapers which are collected by the pilot scheme. The use of recycling points for cans and plastic bottles remained reasonably constant, though these where collected by the pilot scheme.

Table 10-1 Most common materials recycled at recycling point pre- and mid-pilot

Table 10-2 shows the most common reasons cited for not using the pilot scheme service

Table 10-2 Most common reasons for not using the pilot scheme service

¹ Percentage of those respondents who stated they had multi-occupancy recycling service but did not use it.

Amongst those who used the service, 92% were satisfied with the service. The most common suggestions for improvement were: no suggestions for improvement (57%), collect more materials (22%), alternative container type (11%) and collect more often (5%). Figure 10-4 shows the main materials recycled using the pilot scheme.

Figure 10-4 Materials recycled ( SWAG survey results):

10.2.3 Operational feedback

The following points were highlighted by South Lanarkshire Council operational and waste management staff.

• The pilot was considered to offer a high standard of service that engaged with the community and resulted in excellent recyclate quality.
• The frequency of uplift is fixed at fortnightly and flexibility is built into the system such that if additional recyclate is presented in such as plastic bags, this would also be uplifted.
• The rigid 50 litre box was considered an effective container for the storage and presentation of recyclate and of a sufficient capacity for most households. The 37ltr bag also an effective container for paper allowing flexible storage.
• Some properties had an existing chute system for refuse which was attractive for householders to use in preference to using the doorstep collection for recyclates. It was considered that overcoming this system could be problematic.
• Access to properties was considered an issue but of limited scale.
• Prior to implementation of the pilot scheme the Central Scotland Fire Brigade raised concerns regarding the fire safety of operating the pilot scheme. A fire risk assessment was carried out for each property to assess its suitability for the pilot scheme. Subsequently, some properties considered to be of high risk were removed from the scheme. Two main areas of risk were identified:
• the risk of fire raising - recyclates and the containers are potentially flammable materials and when stored in communal stairwells on the day of collection may present a risk; and
• trip hazard caused by full, empty or spilled recycling containers
• To reduce risk, each tenement block was allocated a specific timeslot e.g. Monday 8.30am to 1.30 pm, to reduce where possible the length of time that boxes and bags were left in tenement closes.
• Fire resistant containers are a further option but are not considered a solution.
• Recyclate collected was of exceptional quality. It is considered that as recyclates are stored within households they are thoroughly washed to avoid odour. Quality issues were immediately addressed by collection operatives, who returned any contaminates. Repeated contamination (or non participation) was followed up by a consultation with a waste officer.

10.2.4 Summary of scheme performance

* Percentage of those using the scheme. Based on public opinion surveys, see also results from detailed waste analysis (Section 11)

10.3 Cost effectiveness analysis

West Dunbartonshire Council based their costs of rolling out on the scheme on the operational parameters shown below.

Based on the methodology detailed in Section 3.5 the diversion rate for pilot scheme rollout is estimated to be 65 kg/hh/yr. Therefore, the total amount of material recovered would be 780 tonnes/annum. This could be increased with the addition of a cardboard to the materials collected by the scheme. Rollout costs have been agreed with West Dunbartonshire Council for the existing materials collected and are shown in Table 10-3.

Table 10-3 Pilot Scheme Rollout Costs - West Dunbartonshire Council

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